Glass 




Book J-+. 



Copyright^ . 



COPYRIGHT DEPOSIT: 



5 ei-wick ou Tweed 






OKTH 



S-EA 










MODERN ENGLAND. 



THE LEADING 



Facts or English History, 







D. H. MONTGOMERY. 



- Nothing in the past is dead to the man who ^^^T 
present came to be what it is/' - Stubbs : Const. Hist, of England. 



.OF CO 

v IAN 12 1086 



Of waShin* 



I 



BOSTON: 
PUBLISHED BY GINN & COMPANY. 

1886. 



% 



v> 



V 



Entered according to Act of Congress, in the year 1885, by 

D. H. Montgomery, 
in the office of the Librarian of Congress, at Washington. 



J. 8. Cushing & Co., Printers, Boston. 



I 



I dedicate this book 

to my friend 3L 3- JS-, who generously 

gave time, labor, and valuable 

suggestions towards its 

preparation for 

the press. 



A 



PREFACE. 



MOST of the materials for this book were gath- 
ered by the writer during several years' 
residence in England. 

. The attempt is here made to present them in a 
manner that shall illustrate the great law of national 
growth, in the light thrown upon it by the foremost 
English historians. 

The authorities for the different periods will be 
found grouped in the Chronological Summary which 
follows ; but the author desires to particularly ac- 
knowledge his indebtedness to the works of Gar- 
diner, Guest, and Green, and to the excellent 
constitutional histories of Taswell-Langmead and 
Ransome. 



CONTENTS. 



-•o*— — 



PAGE. 

Descent of the English Sovereigns vii 

Chronology and Authorities xv 

SECTION. 

I. A Glance at the Foundations ; Prehistoric Britain . 1 
II. The Relation of the Geography of England to its 

History 7 

III. A Civilization which did not civilize ; Roman Britain 12 

IV. Laying the Corner-Stone of England; Saxon 

England 19 

V. Building the Norman Superstructure ; the Norman 

Kings 30 

VI. Consolidation of the Normans and Saxons ; Rise 

of the English Nation 42 

VII. The Self-Destruction of Feudalism 70 

VIII. Absolutism of the Crown; the Reformation; the 

Renaissance 80 

IX. The Stuart Period ; the Divine Right of Kings vs. 

the Divine Right of the People . . . . . . 112 

X. The American Revolution ; the House of Commons 

the Paramount Power ; the Era of Reform . . 149 
XI. The Peerage ; the Rise of the English People ; the 

Government ; the Colonies 188 

XII. Outline of Constitutional and Political History . . 207 

Statistics 233 

Indices . 239 



DESCENT OF THE ENGLISH SOVEREIGNS. 



I. 


802 


Egbert, king of Wessex ; in 827 became 


The Anglo- 




overlord of all English kingdoms. He 


Saxon or Eng- 




was descended from Cerdic, first king of 


lish line, 




the West-Saxons, 495. 


802-1013 ? 


836 


Ethelwulf, son of Egbert. 




858 


Ethelbald, son of Ethelwulf. 




860 


Ethelbert, second son of Ethelwulf. 




866 


Ethelred I., third son of Ethelwulf. 




871 


Alfred the Great, fourth son of Ethelwulf ; 
born at Wantage, Berkshire, 849 ; crowned 
at Winchester. 




901 


Edward the Elder, son of Alfred. 




925 


Athelstan, son of Edward the Elder. 




940 


Edmund I., second son of Edward the 
Elder. 




947 


Edred, third son of Edward the Elder. 




955 


Edwy, son of Edmund I. 




958 


Edgar, second son of Edmund I. 




975 


Edward the Martyr, son of Edgar. 




979 


Ethelred II., the Unready, second son of 
Edgar. 




1013 V 


Edmund II., Ironside, son of Ethelred II. 


II. 


1013 V 


Sweyn . 


The Danish line, 


1017 


Canute (Knut). 


1013 7-1042, 


1037 


Harold, Harefoot, second son of Canute. 




1040 


Hardicanute, third son of Canute. 



Ylll 



DESCENT OF THE 



1042 Edward III., the Confessor, second son of 
Ethelred II. ; had no issue ; during his 
reign Earl Godwin was virtually the ruler 
of England. 

1066 Harold II., son of Earl Godwin, and brother- 
in-law of Edward the Confessor 
ten months. 



The Anglo- 
Saxon or 
English line 
(restored), 
1042-1066. 



rn. 

The Norman 

line, 

1066-1154. 



rv. 

The Angevin 
or Plantagenet 
line, 
1154-1399. 



1066 

1087 
1100 



1135 



1154 



reigned 



William the Conqueror, son of Robert, duke 
of Normandy, and cousin of Edward the 
Confessor. 

William II., Rufus, i.e., the Red, second son 
of William I. 

Henry I., third son of William I. ; married 
Matilda, great-granddaughter of Edmund 
Ironside who was a descendant of Cer- 
dic. Hence the Norman line was con- 
nected wdth the English through the 
kinship of William I. with Edward the 
Confessor, and also by Henry's marriage 
with Matilda. Henry left no lawful son, 
but a daughter Matilda, who claimed the 
throne at his death, though only males 
were then considered eligible, since the 
sovereign was required to bear arms and 
lead the forces to battle. 

Stephen, House of Blois, grandson of Wil- 
liam I. by his daughter Adela, who mar- 
ried Stephen, Count of Blois. 



Henry II., great-grandson of William I. by 
his granddaughter Matilda, who married 
Geoffrey, count of Anjou ; hence the title of 
Angevin. From Geoffrey's habit of wear- 
ing in his helmet the broom-plant of 
Anjou (the planta genista), he acquired 
the now famous title of Plantagenet. 



ENGLISH SOVEREIGNS. 



IX 



1189 
1199 



1216 
1274 
1307 

1327 



1377 



Richard L, second son of Henry II. 

John Lackland, fourth son of Henry II. 
The name Sans-terre, or Lackland, was 
given him in derisive allusion to his loss 
of Normandy. 

Henry III., son of John. 1 

Edward I., son of Henry III. 

Edward II., son of Edward I. He was 
deposed by Parliament. 

Edward III., son of Edward II. His eldest 
son, the Black Prince, died during his 
father's reign. 2 

Richard II., second son of Edw T ardthe Black 
Prince. He had no issue. He w 7 as de- 
posed by Parliament. 



V. 

The House of 
Lancaster, the 
Red Rose, 
1399-1461. 



1399 



1413 
1422 



VI. 

The House of 
York, the White 
Rose, 
1461-1485. 



Henry IV., grandson of Edward III., by 
his third son John of Gaunt (corruption 
of Ghent, his birthplace), duke of Lan- 
caster; hence the "House of Lancaster." 

Henry V., son of Henry IV. 

Henry VI., son of Henry V. 



1461 



1483 



Edward IV., great-great-grandson of Edward 
III. by his fourth son Edmund Langley, 
duke of York ; hence the " House of York." 

Edward V., son of Edward IV., supposed 
to have been murdered in the Tower by 
his uncle, Richard III. 



1 Before the accession of Henry III. Parliament made choice of 
any one of the king's sons whom they considered best fitted to 
rule. After that time they always appointed the king's eldest son ; 
or, in case of his demise during the lifetime of his father, the eldest 
son of the eldest son. 

2 The Black Prince : the origin of this name is unknown, but it is 
generally supposed to have been derived from the color of his armor. 



DESCENT OF THE 



483 Richard III., great-great-grandson of Ed- 
ward III. by his fourth son Edmund 
Langley, duke of York. 

The red and the white rose were the badges of the 
Houses of Lancaster and York respectively during the 
civil war. 



vn. 

The House of 

Tudor, 

1485-1603, 



L485 Henry VII., son of Margaret Beaufort, great- 
granddaughter of John of Gaunt, duke 
of Lancaster, by Edmund Tudor, earl of 
Richmond, son of Owen Tudor, who was 
a Welsh gentleman, married to Katha- 
rine, widow of Henry Y. of the House of 
Lancaster. The accession of Henry VII. 
cemented the union of Wales with Eng- 
land ; and revolts, previously frequent, 
were now ended, because the people felt 
that by the king's descent from the 
Tudors they were represented in the 
government. Henry VII. married Eliza- 
beth, daughter of Edward IV., and thus 
the rival Houses of Lancaster and York 
were united. 

1509 Henry VIII., second son of Henry VII., 
came to the throne on the death of his 
elder brother Arthur, Prince of Wales. 
He married (1), 1509, Katharine of Ara- 
gon, widow of his brother Arthur, and 
aunt of the emperor Charles V. She 
was divorced, 1533, after the king's next 
marriage. (2), 1532, Anne Boleyn, maid 
of honor to Katharine ; she was beheaded, 
1536. (3), 1536, Jane Seymour, maid of 
honor to Anne Boleyn; she died, 1539. 
(4), 1540, Anne of Cleves; divorced six 
months after marriage. (5), 1540, Cath- 



ENGLISH SOVEREIGNS. 



XI 





1547 
1553 
1559 


erine Howard, beheaded, 1542. (6), 1543, 
Catherine Parr. She survived the king-. 

Edward VI., son of Henry VIII. by Jane 
Seymour. 

Mary, daughter of Henry VIII. by Katha- 
rine of Aragon. 

Elizabeth, daughter of Henry VIII. by Anne 
Boleyn. 


vm. 

The House of 
Stuart (first 
period), 
1603-1649. 


1603 
1625 


blames I. of England and VI. of Scotland, 
son of Mary, queen of Scots and Henry 
Stuart, Lord Darnley, and great-grandson 
of James IV. of Scotland, who married 
Margaret, daughter of Henry VII. of 
England. Uniting as he did the king- 
doms of England and Scotland, he was 
the first sovereign who bore the title of 
"King of Great Britain." The Stuart 
family were descended from W alter Fitz 
Alan, lord of Oswestry, who, under David 
I. of Scotland, became, in 1124, High 
Steward of Scotland. From this official 
title the name Stuart was derived. 

Charles I., son of James I. ; beheaded, 1649. 


IX. 

The Common- 
wealth and 
Protectorate, 
1649-1660. 


1649 
1653 


After the execution of Charles I. Parliament 
declared England a Commonwealth, or 
free state. The House of Commons was 
nominally the supreme power, the House 
of Lords having been abolished as " use- 
less and dangerous." 

Parliament was dissolved by force by Oliver 
Cromwell, who became Lord Protector. 
He died, 1658. 



Xll 



DESCENT OF THE 





1658 


Richard Cromwell, son of Oliver, became 
Protector at his father's death, but was 
compelled to abdicate in July, 1659. From 
that time until the restoration of Charles 
II., the government was virtually in the 
hands of the army. 


The House of 
Stuart (second 
period), 
1660-1688. 


1660 
1685 


Charles II., son of Charles I. 
James II., second son of Charles I., fled to 
France, 1688. 


X. 
The united 
Houses of 
Stuart and 
Nassau, 
1689-1702. 


1689 


AVilliam III. and Mary. William, Prince 
of Orange (the title derived from a small 
principality near the Rhone), was grand- 
son of Charles I., his mother, Mary, 
daughter of Charles I., having married 
William of Orange, grandson of William 
the Silent. William III. married his 
cousin Mary, daughter of James II. Thus 
he was both nephew and son-in-law of 
James II. They had no issue. The title 
of Nassau is derived from the castle of 
that name, now in ruins, on the river 
Lahn, Germany. 


The House of 
Stuart (third 
period), 
1702-1714. 


1702 


Anne, second daughter of James II., was 
the last of the Stuarts. She married 
Prince George of Denmark, and had 
seventeen children, all of whom died in 
childhood. 


XI. 

The House of 
Hanover (race 
of Brunswick), 
1714 to the 
present time. 


1714 


George I., Elector of Hanover, son of Ernest 
Augustus, duke of Brunswick, who mar- 
ried Sophia, daughter of Elizabeth, who 
was daughter of James I. of England ; 
hence the race of Brunswick, or House 
of Hanover. (By the Act of Settlement, 



ENGLISH SOVEREIGNS. 



Xlll 



1727 
1769 

1820 

1830 

1837 



The Royal 
Family, 1840 
to the present 
time. 



1840 



1840 



1841 



1843 



1701, the crown was to pass, after the 
death of Anne, to the Electress Sophia 
and her Protestant descendants.) 

George II., son of George I. 

George III., son of Frederick, Prince of 
Wales, and grandson of George II. 

George IV., eldest son of George III. He 
had no lawful issue. 

William IV., second son of George III. He 
had no lawful issue. 

Victoria, daughter of Edward, duke of 
Kent, third son of George III., and niece 
of George IV. and of William IV. It 
will be seen, by tracing her lineage, that 
Victoria is descended from both Cerdic 
the Saxon, a.d. 495, and William the 
Conqueror, a.d. 1066. 



Alexandrina Victoria, Queen of Great Bri- 
tain and Ireland, married Prince Albert 
of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha, 1840. (The 
Prince Consort died, 1861.) 

In 1876 the queen was proclaimed Empress 
of India. Her title now is, " Victoria, by 
the grace of God, of the United King- 
dom of Great Britain and Ireland, and of 
the colonies and dependencies thereof, in 
Europe, Asia, Africa, America, and Aus- 
tralasia, QUEEN, Defender of the Faith, 
and Empress of India." 

Issue. — Victoria Adelaide, married the 
Crown Prince of Prussia. 

Albert Edward, Prince of Wales, married 
the Princess Alexandra of Denmark. 

Alice Maud, married the Prince of Hesse 
Darmstadt. 



XIV DESCENT OF THE ENGLISH SOVEREIGNS. 



1844 
184(5 
1848 
1850 

1853 

1857 



Alfred Ernest, Duke of Edinburgh, married 
the Grand Duchess of Russia. 

Helen Augusta, married the Prince of Sles- 
wick-Holstein. 

Louisa Caroline, married the Marquis of 
Lome, late governor of Canada. 

Arthur William, Duke of Connaught, mar- 
ried the Princess of Prussia. 

Leopold George, Duke of Albany, married 
the Princess of Waldeck-Pyrmont. 

Beatrice Maria, married the Prince of Bat- 
tenberg. 

The Royal Household consists of about one 
thousand officers and servants. It has its 
own court of justice, in which are tried 
all cases arising within the Household. 
The queen's annual income is three hun- 
dred and eighty-five thousand pounds 
sterling, from which the expenses of the 
Royal Household are paid. The annual 
allowances granted to the Prince and 
.Princess of Wales and the other members 
of the Royal Family amount to one hun- 
dred and fifty-six thousand pounds, mak- 
ing an aggregate of five hundred and 
forty-one thousand pounds, or about two 
million seven hundred thousand dollars. 



A SUMMARY OF THE PRINCIPAL EVENTS OF 
ENGLISH HISTORY. 



^*>>K< 



I. 

Prehistoric 
Period. 




Britain once a part of the continent of 

Europe. 
The Early, or Rough, Stone Age. 
The Late, or Polished, Stone Age. 
The Bronze Age. 
Introduction of Iron. 


Authorities on 
the Prehistoric 
Period. 




Dawkins' Early Man in Britain. 

Evans' Bronze Implements. 

Guest's Lectures on the History of England. 

The Works of Tylor, Lubbock, and Lyell. 




Interesting articles relating to the Pre- 
historic Period are : — 

The Ancient Cave Men of Devonshire, 
Chamber's Misc. Vol. V. ; 

Monuments of Unrecorded Ages, ibid. Vol. 
VIII. ; 

The Prehistoric Earth, by Prof. A. S. Pack- 
ard, in Gately's World's Progress. 


n. 

Roman Britain, 
B.C. 55 and 
A.D. 43-410. 


B.C. 

55 

A.D. 

43 

61 

78-84 


Ccesar lands in Britain. 

Claudius begins the conquest of Britain. 
Revolt of Boadicea. 

Complete conquest of Britain and establish- 
ment of the Roman power by Agricola. 



XVI 



A SUMMARY OF THE PRINCIPAL 





306 


Constantine is proclaimed emperor in Bri- 
tain. 




401 


The Roman legions are withdrawn from 
Britain. 




410 


Rome is sacked by the Gcths, and the Empe- 
ror Honorius releases the Britons from their 
allegiance. 


Authorities on 




Scarths' Roman Britain. {The best short 


Roman Britain, 




history.) 

* Caesar's Commentaries. 

* Tacitus' Agricola, etc. 

* Gildas' Works. 

Wright's Celt, Roman, and Saxon. 
Elton's Origins of English History. 
Smith's Dictionary of Geography (Britanni- 

cae Insulae). 
Pearson's England during the Early and 

Middle Ages, Vol. I. 


in. 


449 


The Saxons or English land in Britain. 


The Anglo- 


520 


Arthur defeats the Saxons at Badbury, 


Saxon Period, 




Dorsetshire. 


449-1066. 


597 


The coming of Augustine, — conversion of 
the king of Kent. 




827 


Egbert becomes king of all the Saxons or 
English south of the Thames, and over- 
lord of all the English north of it to the 
Forth. 




871 


Alfred the Great. 




878 


The Treaty of Wedmore. 




960 


Dunstan becomes Archbishop of Canter- 
bury. 



* Contemporaneous or early history. 



EVENTS OF ENGLISH HISTORY. 



XV11 





1013? 


Sweyn, king of Denmark, harries England 
and is acknowledged king. 




1017 


Canute, the Dane, chosen king. 




1042 


Restoration of the Saxon line under Ed- 
ward the Confessor. 




1066 


Harold, the last of the Saxon kings, reigns 
ten months (killed at the battle of Hast- 
ings). 


Authorities on 




Grant Allen's Anglo-Saxon Britain. (The 


the Saxon or 




best short histoi*y.) 


English Period. 




Church's Beginning of the Middle Ages. 
Freeman's Norman Conquest, Vols. I. and 

II. 
Lappenberg's England under the Anglo- 










Saxon Kings. 






Green's Making of England. 






Turner's History of the Anglo-Saxons. 






Palgrave's History of the English Common- 






wealth. 






Pearson's History of England during the 






Early and Middle Ages, Vol. I. 






Pauli's Life of Alfred. 






* Asser's Life of Alfred. 






Taine's English Literature, Vol. I. 






* Bede's Ecclesiastical History. 






* The Anglo-Saxon Chronicle. 






* Gildas' Works. 






Elton's Origin of English History. 






Kemble's Saxons in England. 






Stubbs' Constitutional History of England, 
Vol. I. 



* Contemporaneous or early history. 



XV111 



A SUMMARY OF THE PRINCIPAL 



rv. 


1066 


William the Conqueror lands at Pevensey 


The Norman 




(circ. Sept. 28). 


Period, 


1066 


Battle of Senlac, or Hastings (circ. Oct. 14). 


1066-1154, 


1066 


William crowned at Westminster on Christ- 
mas Day. 




1006? 


William grants a charter to London. 




1067? 


Begins building the Tower of London. 




1069 


Harries the Xorth. 




1086 


Domesday Book completed. 




1086 


All the landholders in England swear allegi- 
ance to William at a great meeting held af 
Salisbury. 




1087 


William Rufus, 




1093 


Anselm, Archbishop of Canterbury. 




1094 


William's quarrel ivith Anselm. 




1100 


Henry I. 




1100 


Henry grants a charter. 




1102 


Robert of Belesme rebels. 




1106 


Henry and Anselm come to terms with re- 
gard to investitures. 




1118 


Revolt of the Xorman Baronage. 




1135 


Stephen. 




1136 


Stephen grants a charter. 




1139 


Civil War. 




1153 


Treaty of Wallingford. 


Authorities on 




Freeman's Short History of the Xorman 


the Norman 




Conquest, Johnson's Xormans in Europe. 


Period. 




(The two best small books on the subject.} 
Freeman's Xorman Conquest. 

* The Anglo-Saxon Chronicle. 

* Taylor's Translation of Wace's Roman 
de Rou. 

* William de Junriege. 



* Contemporaneous or early history. 



EVENTS OF ENGLISH HISTORY. 



XIX 







* Ordericus Vitalis. 






* Brace's Bayeux Tapestry Elucidated, with 






plates. 


V. 


1154 


Henry II. 


The House of 


1159 


The payment of scutage, or shield money. 


Anjou, 


1164 


The Constitutions of Clarendon. 


1154-1399. 


1164 


The king quarrels ivith Becket. 




1166 


The Assize of Clarendon. 




1169? 


Partial conquest of Ireland. 




1170 


The murder of Becket. 




1174 


Insurrection of the Barons. 




1176- 






1178 


Judicial and legal reforms. 




1181 


The Assize of Arms. 




1189 


The Great Assize, i.e., examination by a jury 
allowed in civil cases as a substitute for 
trial by battle. 




1189 


Richard I. 




1189 


The king grants charters to towns and sells 
offices to raise money to go to the third 
crusade. 




1190 


The king leaves England for the crusade, 
and does not return until 1194. 




1191 


First legal recognition of the Corporation of 
the City of London. 




1192 


The king taken prisoner by the duke of 
Austria. 




1193 


Released on payment of a heavy ransom by 
England. 




1197 


Richard builds Chateau Gaillard on the 
the Seine, above Rouen, to defend his 
Norman possessions. 




1199 


John. 



* Contemporaneous or early history. 



XX 



A SUMMARY OF THE PRINCIPAL 





1203 


Murder of Arthur. 




1204 


John loses Normandy and Anjou. 


• 


1208 


John refuses to receive Stephen Langton as 
Archbishop of Canterbury, and the pope 
puts England under Interdict. 




1213 


John becomes the pope's vassal. 




1215 


John grants the Great Charter, June 15. 




1216 


Henry III. 




1232 


A long period of bad government begins. 




1259 


The Provisions of Oxford. 




1260? 


Henry begins to rebuild "Westminster abbey. 




1264 


Battle of Lewes. Victory of Simon de Mont- 
fort, Earl of Leicester. 




1265 


Rise of the House of Commons under Earl 
Simon. 




1265 


Battle of Evesham ; Earl Simon killed. 




1267 


Roger Bacon writes his Opus Majus. 




1274 


Edward I. 




1282 


Conquest of Wales. 




1290 


Expulsion of the Jews. 




1295 


Final organization of Parliament (barons, 
clergy and commons). 




1296 


Edward conquers Scotland. 




1303 


Execution of Wallace. 




1306 


Defeat of Robert Bruce. 




1307 


Edward II. 




1314 


Battle of Bannockburn. 




1327 


Edward II. deposed. 




1327 


Edward III. 




1328 


Independence of Scotland recognized. 




1337 


War with France and Scotland. 




1339 


Beginning of the Hundred Years' War with 
France. 




1346 


Victory of Crecy. 




1347 


Capture of Calais. 




1349 


The Black Death. 



EVENTS OF ENGLISH HISTORY. 



XXI 





1351 


Statute of Laborers. 




1353 


First statute of Praemunire. 




1356 


Victory of Poictiers. 




13G0 


Treaty of Bretigny. England gives up all 
of France north of the Loire, but retains 
most of the country south of it. 




1377 


Wycliffe begins the Reformation, — Lollard- 
ism. 




1377 


Richard II. 




1380 


Langland writes Piers the Ploughman. 




1381 


Revolt of the peasants under Wat Tyler. 




1388 


Battle of Chevy Chase. 




1390? 


Chaucer twites the Canterbury Tales. 




1399 


Richard deposed. 


Authorities on 




Stubbs' Early Plantagenets, Warburton's 


the House of 




Edward III., Pearson's England in the 


Anjou. 




Fourteenth Century. {The three best short 
histories relating to the period.) 
Stubbs' Constitutional History of England. 

* Florence of Worcester. 

* Roger of Hoveden. 

* Matthew Paris. 
Blaauw's Barons' War. 
Stubbs' Illustrative Documents. 

* Froissart's Chronicles. 

Seebohm's Essays (on the Black Death), 
Fortnightly Review, 1865. 

Taine's English Literature. 

Church's Life of Anselm. 

Wallon's Richard TI. 

Shakespeare's John, and Richard II. (Hud- 
son's edition). 



* Contemporaneous or early history. 



XXII 



A SUMMARY OF THE PRINCIPAL 



VI. 


1399 


Henry IV. 


The House of 


1400 


Revolt of Owen Glendower. 


Lancaster (the 


1401 


Statute against heresy. William Sautre, the 


Red Eose). 




Jirst martyr, burned for Lollardry. 


1399-1461. 


1403 


Revolt of the Percies. Battle of Shrewsbury. 




1413 


Henry V. 




1414 


Meeting of disaffected Lollards. Severe 
measures against them. 




1415 


Victory of Agincourt. 




1422 


Henry VI. crowned king of England and 
France at Paris. 




1429 


Siege of Orleans. 




1431 


Joan of Arc burned. 




1450 


Cade's insurrection. 




1451 


Loss of French possessions. 




1455 


Wars of the Roses. First battle of St. 
Albans. 




1460 


Battle of Wakefield. 




1461 


Second battle of St. Albans. 




1461 


Henry dethroned. 


Authorities on 




Gairdner's Houses of Lancaster and York. 


the House of 




{The best short history.) 


Lancaster. 




Brougham's England under the House of 
Lancaster. 

* Gairdner's Edition of the Paston Let- 
ters. 

Reed's English History in Shakespeare. 

* Fabyan's Chronicle. 

* Stow's Annals, etc. 

Shakespeare's Henry IV., V., and VI. (Hud- 
son's edition). 



* Contemporaneous or early history. 



EVENTS OF ENGLISH HISTORY. 



XX111 



VII. 


1461 


Edward IV. 


The House of 


1461 


Battle of Towton. 


York (the 


1471 


Battles of Barnet and Tewksbury. 


White Rose), 


1471 


Henry VI., the late king, dies, or is murdered, 


1461-1485. 




while a prisoner in the Tower. 




1477 


Caxton sets up a printing-press in the precincts 
of Westminster abbey and prints the Jirst 
booh in England. 




1483 


Edward V. (reigns two months) murdered 
in the Tower by the duke of Gloucester, 
the Protector (afterwards Richard III.). 




1483 


Richard III. 




1485 


Henry, earl of Richmond, lands at Milford 
Haven (Aug. 7). 




1485 


Battle of Bosworth Field, death of Richard 
(Aug. 22). 


Authorities on 




See authorities on House of Lancaster. 


the House of 




Gairdner's Richard III. 


York. 




Sir Thomas More's Richard III. 
Shakespeare's Richard III. (Hudson's edi- 
tion). 
Sir Thomas More 1 s Edward V. 


VIII. 


1485 


Henry VII. 


The House of 


1487 


Symnel, the Pretender, claims the crown. 


Tudor, union of 


1496 


Warbeck, the second Pretender, claims the 


the White and 




crown. 


the Red Rose, 


1497 


Sebastian Cabot lands in America. 


1485-1603. 


1499 


Colet and Erasmus at Oxford. 




1509 


Henry VIII. 




1512 


Colet founds St. Paul's School. 




1513 


Battle of the Spurs and of Flodden. 




1513 


Wolsey becomes chief minister. 




1516 


Sir Thomas More writes " Utopia." 




1519 


Field of the Cloth of Gold. 



XXIV 



A SUMMARY OF THE PRINCIPAL 



1525 
1527 
1529 
1531 

1532 
1533 
1534 
1535 

1536? 
1536 

1530 
1539 

1530 
1542 

1543 

1547 
1547 
1548 



1552 
1552 
1553 
1553 
1554 



1555 
1558 
1559 
1559 



Tyndale translates the Bible. 

Henry resolves on a divorce. 

Fall of Wolsey. 

Henry acknowledged the Supreme Head of the 
" Church of England." 

Henry privately marries Anne Boleyn. 

Divorced from Katharine. 

Act of Supremacy. 

Thomas Cromwell, vicar-general. Execu- 
tion of More. 

The pope excommunicates Henry. 

Henry publishes the English Bible. 

Dissolution of the lesser monasteries. 

The Law of the Six Articles. 

Suppression of the greater abbeys. 

The Tudor conquest of Ireland nearly com- 
pleted. 

Execution of Cromwell. 

Edward VI. 

Battle of Pinkie. 

Publication of the Book of Common Prayer. 
Protestantism established. Act of Uni- 
formity. 

Suppression of chantries. 

Grammar schools and Hospitals founded. 

Mary. 

Lady Jane Grey executed. 

Mary repeals the laws against the Roman 
Catholics (but the monastic lands remain 
in the hands of their then owners). Sup- 
presses the Book of Common Prayer. 

Severe persecution of Protestants. 

England loses Calais. 

Elizabeth. 

Restores royal supremacy and the Book of 
Common Prayer. 



EVENTS OF ENGLISH HISTORY. 



XXV 





1562 


First penal statute against Catholics. 




1562 


First poor law. 




1563 


Hawkins begins the slave trade with Africa. 




1563 


The Thirty-Nine Articles imposed on the clergy. 




1577 


Drake circumnavigates the globe. 




1586 


Shakespeare plays at the Blackfriars and 
Globe Theatres in London. 




1587 


Execution of Mary Queen of Scots. 




1588 


Defeat of the Armada. 




1590 


Spenser publishes the Faery Queen. 




1597 


Bacon publishes his Essays. 




1603 


Completion of the Conquest of Ireland. 


Authorities on 




Creighton's Elizabeth, Seebohm's Protestant 


the House of 




Revolution . ( Th e two best short histories.) 


Tudor. 




Hallam's Constitutional History. 

* Holinshed's Chronicle to 1577. 

Lingard's England. 

Froude's Short Studies. 

Froude's England. 

Shakespeare's Henry VIII. (Hudson's edi- 
tion). 

Nichols' Progresses of Queen Elizabeth. 

Aikin's Memoirs of the Court of Queen 
Elizabeth. 

Dixon's Church of England. 

Macaulay's Essay on Lord Burleigh. 


IX. 


1603 


James I. (King of England and Scotland.) 


The House of 


1604 


Hampton Court Conference. 


Stuart, first 


1604 


James persecutes the Puritans. 


period. 


1605 


The Gunpowder Plot. 


1603-1649. 


1615 


Sale of Peerages. 




1617 


Execution of Sir Walter Raleigh. 



* Contemporaneous history. 



XXVI 



A SUMMARY OF THE PRINCIPAL 





1620 


Lord Bacon publishes his philosophy (No- 
vum Organum). 




1620 


Landing of the Pilgrim Fathers in New Eng- 
land. 




1620 


Impeachment of Lord Bacon. 




1621 


James tears up the protest of the Commons. 




1622 


The first neicspaper published in England, 
" The Weekley Neices." 




1625 


Charles I. 




1628 


The Petition of Right. 




1631 


Went worth (Lord Strafford) Lord Deputy 
in Ireland. 




1633 


Laud Archbishop of Canterbury. 




1637 


Hampden refuses to pay ship-money. 




1637? 


Strafford's policy of " Thorough." 




1637? 


Laud persecutes the Puritans. 




1640 


The Long Parliament meets. 




1641 


Execution of Strafford. 




1641 


The Grand Remonstrance (November). 




1642 


The king attempts to seize the fve members. 




1642 


Beginning of the civil war. Battle of Ed gehill 
(Oct. 23). 




1644 


Battle of Marston Moor. 




1645 


Cromwell reorganizes the Parliamentarian 
army (the " new model "). 




1645 


Battle of Naseby. 




1646 


Charles surrenders to the Scots. 




1647 


The Scots give up Chai'les to the English. 




1648 


Pride's Purge. 




1649 


Execution of Charles. 


Authorities for 


Gardiner's Stuarts and the Puritan Revolu- 


the House of 


tion. (The best short history.) 


Stuart, first 




Gardiner's History of James I. 


period. 




Ranke's History of England in the Seven- 
teenth Century. 



EVENTS OF ENGLISH HISTORY. 



XXV11 



X. 

Commonwealth 
and Protector- 
ate, 1649-1660. 



1649 
1649 
1650 
1651 
1652 
1653 
1654 
1654 
1656 
1657 



1658 
1659 
1659 
1660 



Authorities on 
the Common- 
wealth and 
Protectorate. 



* Clarendon's History of the Rebellion. 

* May's History of the Long Parliament. 
Gardiner's England under Charles I. 
Goldwin's Smith's English Statesman. 
Forster's Sir John Eliot. 

Macaulay's Essays on Bacon, Hampden, 

and Hallam. 
Hume's England. 



England proclaims itself a Commonwealth. 

The House of Lords abolished. 

Battle of Dunbar. 

Battle of Worcester. Flight of Charles II. 

War with the Dutch. 

Cromwell expels Parliament by force. 

" The Instrument of Government.** 

Oliver Cromwell Lord Protector. 

War with Spain. 

Cromwell, at the request of the army, de- 
clines the crown (the "Humble Petition 
and Advice"). 

Richard Cromwell Protector. 

Richard compelled to abdicate (July). 

The army rules. 

The Convention Parliament invites Charles 
II. to return (April 25). 



Guizot's English Revolution. 
Guizot's Oliver Cromwell. 
* Life of Col. Hutchinson (Bohn). 
Bisset's History of the Commonwealth. 
Carlyle's Life and Letters of Cromwell, and 
Hero Worship. 



* Contemporaneous history. 



XXV111 



A SUMMARY OF THE PRINCIPAL 



House of Stuart, 


1660 


Charles II. 


second period, 


1661 


Act of Uniformity re-enacted. 


1660-1688. 


1662 


The Puritan clergy driven out. 




1662 


The Royal Society established. 




1664 


The Conventicle Act. John Bunyan and 
others imprisoned. 




1664 


The Dutch War. 




1665 


The Five Mile Act. 




1665 


The Plague in London. 




1666 


The Great Fire in London. 




1667 


Milton writes Paradise Lost. 




1670 


Secret Treaty of Dover. 




1670 


Bunyan writes the Pilgrim's Progress. 




1671 


The king robs the exchequer. 




1673 


The Test Act. 




1678 


Titus Oates invents the so-called Popish Plot. 




1679 


Habeas Corpus Act passed. 




1682 


The Rye-House Plot. 




1683 


Lord Russell and Algernon Sidney executed. 




1685 


James II. 




1685 


Insurrection of Monmouth. 




1685 


Battle of Sedgemoor. 




1685 


The Bloody Assizes. 




1687 


Sir Isaac Neicton publishes the Principia, 
demonstrating the law of Gravitation. 




1687 


Expulsion of the Fellows of Magdalen 
College, Oxford. 




1687 


Declaration of Indulgence. 




1688 


Clergy refuse to read the Declaration of 
Indulgence. 




1688 


Imprisonment of the Seven Bishops ; their 
acquittal. 




1688 


William of Orange invited to England. 




1688 


Flight of James. 




1688 


The Interregnum (Dec. 23, 1688, to Feb. 13, 
1689). 




1689 


The Declaration of Rights. 



EVENTS OF ENGLISH HrSTOllY. 



XXIX 



United Houses 


1689 


William and Mary. 


of Nassau and 


1689 


Siege of Londonderry. 


Stuart, 


1689 


Mutiny Bill. 


1689-1702. 


1689 


Toleration Bill. 




1689 


The Bill of Rights. 




1689 


The Nonjurors. 




1690 


The Battle of the Boyne. — James II. defeated. 




1692 


Massacre of Glencoe. 




1692 


Battle of La Hogue, 




1693 


Beginning of the National Debt. 


, 


1694 


The Bank of England established. 




1694 


Death of the Queen. 




1694 


Triennial Act passed. 




1695 


The Press made free. 




1697 


Peace of Ryswick. 




1701 


Act of Settlement passed. 


House of Stuart 


1702 


Anne, the last Stuart sovereign. 


revived, 


1703 


First Daily Newspaper, " The London 


1702-1714. 




Courant" (Addison, Swift, Defoe, Pope). 




1704 


Battle of Blenheim. 




1706 


Battle of Ramillies. 




1707 


Act of Union with Scotland (the Kingdom of 
Great Britain). 




1711 


Addison publishes the " Spectator." 




1712 


Dismissal of Marlborough. 




1713 


Treaty of Utrecht. 


Authorities on 




Hale's Fall of the Stuarts, Morris' Age of 


the House of 




Anne. ( The two best short histories relating 


Stuart, second 




to the period.) 


period. 




* Evelyn's Diary, 1623-1659. 

* Pepys' Diary, 1659-1669. 



* Contemporaneous history. 



XXX 



A SUMMARY OF THE PRINCIPAL 







Macaulay's England. 






Stanhope's History of England. 






Macaulay's Essay on Mackintosh's History. 






Macaulay's Essays on the War of the Spanish 
Succession, on the Comic Dramatists of 
the Restoration, and on Milton. 

Taine's History of English Literature. 

* Burnet's History of His Own Times. 

Guizot's History of Civilization, Chap. XIII. 


XL 


1714 


George I. 


House of 


1715 


The Pretender in Scotland. 


Hanover, 1714 


1720 


The South Sea Company. 


to the present 


1727 


War with Austria and Spain. 


time. 


1727 


George II. 




1738 


Rise of the Methodists under John Wesley. 




1739 


Hogarth and Fielding. 




1745 


The Young Pretender. 




1746 


Battle of Culloden. 




1748 


Peace of Aix-la-Chapelle. 




1751 


Introduction of the New Style. (The year 
now begins on Jan. 1 instead of March 
25.) 

Seven Years' War with France. 




1755 




1757 


Clive wins the victory of Plassey, India. 




1759 


Battle of Quebec. — Death of Wolfe. — 
England gains Canada. 




1760 


George III. 




1765 


Stamp Act passed. 




1765 


Watt invents' the Steam Engine. 




1766 


Repeal of the Stamp Act. 




1768 


Arkwright invents his Spinning Machine. 




1769 


Letters of Junius. 



* Contemporaneous history. 



EVENTS OF ENGLISH HISTORY. 



XXXI 



1775 
1776 
1781 
1783 

1786 
1793 
1800 
1805 
1807 
1809 
1811 
1811 

1812 
1815 
1819 
1820 
1829 
1830 
1830 

1833 



1833 
1837 
1839 
1840 
1846 
1848 
1854 
1855 
1855 

1858 
1861 



Beginning of the American Revolution. - - 

Independence declared July 4. 
Defeat of Lord Cornwallis at Yorktown. 
Recognition of the Independence of the United 

States. 
Trial of Warren Hastings. 
War with France. • 

Act of Union with Ireland. 
Battle of Trafalgar. 
Abolition of the Slave Trade. 
The Peninsula War. 
Luddite Riots. 
The king becomes insane, and the Prince of 

Wales is made Regent. 
Second War with America. 
Battle of Waterloo (Sunday, June 18). 
First Atlantic Steamship, The Savannah. 
George IV. 

Passage of the Catholic Emancipation Bill. 

William IV. 

First Railway (the Liverpool and Manches- 
ter) opened in England. 

Emancipation of Slaves in the British 
Colonies. 

East India Trade thrown open. 

Victoria. 

The Opium War. 

Penny Postage introduced. 

Famine in Ireland. Repeal of the Corn La ws. 

The Chartists. 

War with Russia. 

Capture of Sebastopol. 

Abolition of the Newspaper Tax. — Rise of 
Cheap Newspapers. 

The Atlantic Cable laid. 

Death of Prince Albert. 



XXX11 



A SUMMARY OF THE PRINCIPAL 





1861 


The Trent affair. 




1862 


The Escape of the Alabama. 




1867 


Reform Bill extending the franchise. 




1868 


Compulsory Church Rates abolished. 




1869 


Disestablishment of the Irish branch of the 
Church of England. 


• 


1870 


Irish Land Bill. 




1870 


Foundation of the Government (" Board ") 
Schools. 




1871 


Abolition of Religious tests in the Uni- 
versities. 




1872 


The Geneva Conference awards £3,500,000 
to the United States for damages caused by 
the Alabama. 




1876 


The Queen made Empress of India. 




1879 


Formation of the Irish Land League. 




1881 


The Second Irish Land Bill. 




1882 


Crimes Act passed, directed against Land 
League in Ireland. 




1884 


Reform of Elections (Corrupt Practices Bill). 




1SS1 


Passage of the Franchise Bill extending the 
borough franchise to the counties. 




1885 


Resignation of the Gladstone Ministry. 




1885 


The Marquis of Salisbury accepts the office 
of Prime Minister. 




1885 


Over 1,300,000 new voters admitted in England 
under the Franchise Bill. 


Authorities on 




Ludlow's American Revolution (one of the 


the House of 




best short histories). 


Hanoveri 




Bancroft's History of the United States. 
Macaulay's Essays on Warren Hastings, 

Clive, Pitt, Madam D'Arblay, Walpole, 

Chatham, and Johnson. 
Lecky's History of the 18th Century. 
Green's Causes of the American Revolution. 



EVENTS OF ENGLISH HISTORY. 



XXX111 



* Walpole's Memoirs and Letters. 
McCarthy's History of Our Own Times. 
McCarthy's England under Gladstone. 
Thackeray's Four Georges. 
Masson's England under George III. 
May's Constitutional History. 
Stanhope's History of England. 
Trevelyan's Life of Fox. 
Stephenson's Life of James Watt. 
Martineau's History of England. 
Wharton's Wits and Beaux of Society. 
Carlyle's Essay on Johnson. 
Taine's English Literature. 



* Contemporaneous history. 

Note. For fuller information in regard to authorities, see Prof. 
Allen's excellent little work, The Reader's Guide to English His- 
tory. Where a critical estimate of the writer is desired, consult 
Prof. Adams' Manual of Historical Literature, and Mullinger's 
Authorities. The best general histories of England (aside from 
Hume, Lingard Macaulay, and Stanhope) are Green's Short History 
of the English People, Bright's English History, and the Student's 
Hume. For young people nothing equals Gardiner's History of 
England for Young Folks, and Guest's Lectures on English History. 
The Constitutional History of England (see Stubbs, Hallam, Creasy, 
and May) is ably presented in a single volume by Taswell-Langmead, 
and in more condensed form by Ransome. 

Valuable works of reference are: Knight's Pictorial History of 
England ; Tymms' Topography of England ; Bonn's Cyclopedia of 
Political Knowledge; The Dictionary of English History (Low & 
Pulling); Johnston's Historical Maps; Whitaker's Almanack; Be- 
van's Statistical Atlas of England, Scotland, and Ireland. 

On modern England and English life, see Irving's Bracebrid^e 
Hall, and Sketch Book ; Emerson's English Traits ; Colman's Euro- 
pean Life and Manners ; Hawthorne's Our Old Home, and Note 
Books ; Howitt's Visits to Remarkable Places, and Rural Life ; 



XXxiv EVENTS OF ENGLISH HISTORY. 

Taine's Notes on England; Naclal's London Society; Hoppin's Old 
England ; Higginson's English Statesmen ; R. G. White's England 
Without and Within; Escott's England; Laugel's L'Angleterre; 
Daryl's La Vie Publique en Angleterre ; Max O'Rell's John Bull et 
son He ; Society in London, by a Foreign Resident (Harper). 



THE 



Leading Pacts of English History. 



)>^00- 



I. 

• «►.- 

" This fortress built by Nature for herself 
Against infection and the hand of war ; 
This happy breed of men, this little world, 
This precious stone set in the silver sea, 
Which serves it in the office of a wall, 
Or as a moat defensive to a house, 
Against the envy of less happier lands ; 
This blessed plot, this earth, this realm, this England." 

Shakespeare, Richard II. 

o-o^g^oc 

PREHISTORIC BRITAIN. 
A Glance at the Foundations. 

THE island of Great Britain, as abundant geo- 
logical evidence proves, was originally part 
of the continent of Europe. The chalk cliffs of 
Dover are simply a continuation of the chalk of 
Calais, and in dredging the shallow waters of the 
channel, never more than thirty fathoms deep, the 
same fossil remains of animals are brought up that 
are found buried in the soil of England and of 
France. 



2 THE LEADING FACTS 

As in the life of a child there is an important 
period when he cannot record his thoughts, cannot 
even express them, but when he is, none the less, 
thinking, learning, and unconsciously shaping his 
character for the future, so there is a similar period 
of growth in the life of the human race before 
written history begins. 

Prehistoric man in Britain probably took up his 
abode there before it was severed from the main- 
land. From the extensive and careful researches 
made by archaeologists, we have reason to believe 
that his condition was that of the lowest savage. 
Raised but one degree of intelligence above the 
wild beasts around him, like them he dwelt in the 
caves of Devonshire or burrowed in the hills of 
Kent, or, somewhat further advanced, built for him- 
self a hut of bark in the primeval forests of the 
north. 

He lived by hunting and fishing. His tools and 
weapons were made of pieces of flint, chipped to an 
edge ; his clothing was the furry hide of some crea- 
ture he had killed. His religion was the terror in- 
spired by the great forces and convulsions of nature 
and by the dangers to which he was constantly 
exposed. 

The grassy barrows scattered throughout England 
are the burial-mounds of those who fell in the inces- 



OF ENGLISH HISTORY. 3 

sant battles of hostile tribes; while the rude bowlder- 
tombs, such as the well-known " Kit's Coty-house,' , 
near Maidstone in Kent, show the regard that was 
paid to the chiefs who led their fierce hand-to-hand 
contests. 

In a later stage of progress prehistoric man had 
learned to smooth and polish his flint implements; 
to shape clay into useful vessels, and to bake them 
in the fire; to weave coarse cloth; and to herd and 
keep cattle. The epochs during which flint im- 
plements were used are known as the early and 
late Stone Ages, as for similar reasons subsequent 
epochs are called the Age of Bronze and the Age 
of Iron. 

There are grounds for supposing that it was dur- 
ing this late Stone Period that England assumed 
the geographical form which it has to-day. Re- 
cent excavations seem to show that the men of 
those times were small in stature ; they are, per- 
haps, best represented now by the people of south- 
ern Wales. 

We have, at present, no sufficient data for deter- 
mining with accuracy how long ago the age that we 
have been describing came to a close ; but we know 
that the Stone Races must have been contemporary 
with the mammoth, the Irish elk, and other animals 
long extinct, since they have left incised drawings 



4 THE LEADING FACTS 

of these creatures, on bones and tusks, of which 
a large and most interesting collection may be seen 
in the British Museum. 

The use of bronze, which practically marks the 
final stage of the prehistoric period, would appear 
to have been introduced by the invasion of a supe- 
rior race from the continent, who had discovered how 
to melt and mingle copper and tin, which they cast 
into spear-heads, axes and other implements. 

These invaders seem to have driven back the 
native British tribes, and to have conquered the 
island by dint of their greater strength and their 
better weapons ; as they, in turn, were afterwards 
driven back and conquered by the Roman legions 
who came armed with swords of steel. 

The Bronze Men, as they have been called, were 
probably an offshoot of the large-limbed, fair-haired 
Celts of Gaul. They had ceased to be a purely 
nomadic race, and were in advance of what the 
Stone Men had acquired. They lived in settle- 
ments, built roofed houses of wattle-work, and prac- 
tised systematic tillage of the soil. They all spoke 
the same language, so that, as a recent writer says, 

Note. — Iron had come into use in Britain some little time before 
the Roman Conquest, but the difficulty of working it probably pre- 
vented it from being generally employed for either tools or weapons. 
Caesar says the Britons had iron rings for money. 



OF ENGLISH HISTOKY. 5 

one might have been understood then had lie asked 
for bread and cheese in Celtic, anywhere from the 
borders of Scotland to the southern boundaiy of 
France. 

Rude as these prehistoric people seemed to CaBsar, 
as he met them in battle array, clad in skins, 
with their faces stained with the deep-blue dye of 
the woad plant, yet they proved not unworthy foe- 
men even against his veteran troops. They were 
barbarians and nothing more, } r et it is well to bear 
in mind that all the progress that civilization has 
made was built on the foundation which they 
slowly and painfully laid during unknown centuries 
of toil and strife ; for to them we owe the taming 
of the dog and of other domestic animals, the first 
working of metals, and the beginnings of agriculture 
and of art. 

They, too, held some dim faith in an overruling 
power and in a life beyond the grave, since they 
offered human sacrifices to the one, and buried the 
warrior's spear with him that he might be provided 
for the other. Their Druid priests, who gathered 
the sacred mistletoe from the branches of the oaks 
under which they worshiped, acted also as judges 
and as teachers. 

Cassar tells us that " they did much inquire and 
hand down to the youth concerning the stars and 

\ 



6 THE LEADING FACTS 

their motions, concerning the magnitude of the 
earth, concerning the nature of things and the 
might and the power of the immortal gods." 

They did more, for they not only transmitted 
their beliefs and hopes from generation to genera- 
tion, but they gave them architectural form and 
permanence in the massive columns of hewn stone 
which they raised in that temple, open to the sky, 
still to be seen on Salisbury plain, on one of whose 
fallen blocks Carlyle and Emerson — those Druids 
of our own time — sat, and discussed the same great 
questions, when they made their pilgrimage to 
Stonehenge forty years ago. 



OF ENGLISH HISTORY. 



II. 



" Father Neptune one day to dame Freedom did say, 
' If ever I lived upon dry land, 
The spot I should hit on would be little Britain.' 
Says Freedom, ' Why that's my own island.' 
0, 'tis a snug little island, 
A right little, tight little island ! 
Search the world round, none can be found 
So happy as this little island. " T. Dibdin. 



o-O^OcJOO 

THE GEOGRAPHY OF ENGLAND IN RELATION TO ITS 

HISTORY. 

As material surroundings strongly influence in- 
dividual life, so the physical features — situation 
and climate — of a country have a marked influence 
on its history. 

The insular form of Great Britain gave it a cer- 
tain advantage over the continent during the age 
when the northern tribes were plundering Rome 
and devastating the countries of southern Europe. 
As their invasions of England could only be by sea, 
they were necessarily on a comparatively small scale. 
They could not at once overrun the whole land, as 



8 THE LEADING FACTS 

they did in France, and hence the strife was long 
maintained by hope of successful resistance ; and 
thus courage and the virtues that depend on cour- 
age were kept alive and transmitted. 

The same fact unquestionably did much toward 
developing the spirit of adventure and the com- 
mercial enterprise which have made England the 
greatest colonizing nation of the world, and have 
extended her empire to every part of the habitable 
globe. 

At the time of the threatened attack by the 
Spanish Armada, when the tempest had dispersed 
the enemy's fleet and wrecked many of its vessels, 
leaving only a few to creep back, crippled and dis- 
heartened, to the ports whence they had so proudly 
sailed, Elizabeth fully recognized the value of the 
" ocean-wall " to her dominions. 

So Madame de Remusat, speaking of Napoleon's 
intended expedition, which was postponed and ul- 
timately abandoned on account of a sudden and 
long-continued storm, says "a few leagues of sea 
saved England from being forced to engage in a 
war, which, if it had not entirely trodden civiliza- 
tion under foot, would have certainly crippled it for 
a whole generation." Finally, to quote the words 
of Professor Goldwin Smith, "the English Channel, 
by exempting England from keeping up a large 



OF ENGLISH HISTORY. 9 

standing army, has preserved her from military 
despotism, and enabled her to move steadily for- 
ward in the path of political progress." 

With regard to the climate of England, — its 
insular character, geographical position and, espe- 
cially, its exposure to the warm currents of the 
Gulf-stream, give it a mild temperature particularly 
favorable to the full and healthy development of 
both animal and vegetable life. Nowhere is found 
greater vigor or greater longevity. Charles II. said 
that he was convinced that there was not a country 
in the world where one could spend so much time 
out of doors comfortably as in England; and he 
might have added that the people appreciate this 
fact and habitually avail themselves of it. 

From an industrial and historical point of view the 
country falls into two divisions. If a line be drawn 
from Whitby, on the north-east coast, to Leicester, 
in the midlands, and thence to Exmouth, on the 
south-west coast, on the upper or north-west side 
of that line will lie all the coal and nearly all the 
mineral wealth and manufacturing industry of Eng- 
land ; and also all the large cities except London ; 
while on the lower or south-east side of the line will 
be the comparatively level surface which furnishes 
the rich agricultural lands and most of the fine 
old cathedral towns with their historic associations ; 



10 THE LEADING FACTS 

in a word, the England of the past, as contrasted 
with modern and democratic England. 

Lastly, it is worthy of remark that many names 
of places throughout England are directly connected 
with its physical geography, and nearly all with its 
history, on which they often throw important light. 
Thus Chester, Worcester and, in general, names 
ending in ' Chester ' or ' cester ' — as Dorchester, 
Leicester and the like, mark the period of Roman 
occupation, and indicate that they were once walled 
towns and military stations. Places whose names 
end in ' by,' as Derby, Grimsby, Rugby, — which, 
with scarce an exception, are north of London, — 
are of Danish origin, and in a majority of cases date 
back to the time when Alfred made the treaty of 
Wedmore, near the close of the ninth century, 
by which the Danes agreed to confine themselves 
to the northern half of the country. Only a few 
names are of Norman origin, as Richmond and 
Beaumont, and they generally show us where the 
Normans built a castle or an abbey, or had con- 
quered a district in Wales. Nearly all the local 
names are of Saxon or Celtic origin, and have 
remained unchanged since the landing of Hengist 
and Horsa. Many of the Welsh names carry us 
back to the Bronze and Stone Ages, as do nearly 
all the names of rivers, as Avon, i.e., " The Water," 



OF ENGLISH HISTORY. 11 

for example, so frequently repeated in England ; 
and however uncouth their barbarous accumulation 
of consonants may be, the prehistoric man could 
doubtless pronounce Llanfaelrhys or Llangwenllwyfo 
as readily and cheerfully as one of the aborigines of 
New England could tell the pilgrim fathers where to 
look for Quononchontaug or Woonasquatucket. 



12 THE LEADING FACTS 



III. 



" Force and Right rule the world : Force, till Right is ready." 

Joubert. 



-o-oX^JOo- 



ROMAN BRITAIN: B.C. 55 and A.D. 43-410. 
A CIVILIZATION WHICH DID NOT CIVILIZE. 

Our first account of Britain comes from the pen 
of Julius Caesar. He had vanquished the tribes of 
Gaul and, late in the summer of 55 B.C., had reached 
that part of the coast where Boulogne is now situ- 
ated, opposite which one may see on a clear day 
the gleaming chalk-cliffs of Dover so vividly de- 
scribed in Shakespeare's King Lear. While en- 
camped on the shore he "resolved," he says, "to pass 
over into Britain, having had trustworthy information 
that in all his wars with the Gauls, the enemies of 
the commonwealth had constantly received help 
from thence." 

Embarking, with a force of between eight thousand 
and ten thousand men, in eighty small vessels, lie 
crossed the channel and landed not far from Dover, 
where he overcame the Britons, who made a des- 
perate resistance. After a stay of a few weeks, dur- 



OF ENGLISH HISTORY. 13 

ing which fime he did not leave the coast, he 
returned to Gaul. The next year, a little earlier in 
the season, he made a second invasion with a much 
larger force, and penetrated the country to a short 
distance north of the Thames. Before the Septem- 
ber gales set in he re-embarked for the continent, 
never to return. The total results of his two expedi- 
tions were a number of captives carried, as hostages, 
to Rome, and some vague promises of tribute which 
were never fulfilled. Tacitus remarks, "He discov- 
ered the country, but did not conquer it." For 
nearly a hundred years no second attempt was made, 
but, as the same historian informs us, " there was a 
long oblivion of Britain." In A.D. 43 Plautius es- 
tablished the Latin power in the west and midlands, 
overcoming Caractacus after nine years' fighting and 
gaining possession meantime of a little Celtic settle- 
ment on the Thames, consisting of a few miserable 
huts and a row of entrenched cattle-pens, called in 
the British tongue Llyn-din, or the Fort on the Lake, 
which, pronounced with difficulty by Roman lips, 
became the name which the world now knows wher- 
ever ships sail, trade reaches, or history is read — 
London. 

Twenty years later, Boadicea, " the Cleopatra of 
the North," maddened by the insults and outrages of 
the brutal soldiery of Nero, headed a revolt which 



14 THE LEADING FACTS 

for a time threatened to restore the country to the 
Britons ; but in a final battle, fought on ground 
within sight of where St. Paul's cathedral now 
stands, the Roman general gained a complete vic- 
tory, and Boadicea, like the Egyptian queen, took 
her own life rather than fall into the hands of her 
conqueror. She died, let us trust, as the poet has 
represented, animated by the prophecy of the Druid 
priest, that 

" Rome shall perish — write that word 
In the blood that she has spilt ; — 
Perish, hopeless and abhorred, 
Deep in ruin, as in guilt." 

From this date the Roman power went on advanc- 
ing, until under Hadrian and Constantine the whole 
of England was subdued. During the three and a 
half centuries which measure this period, the entire 
surface of the country underwent a great change. 
Forests were cleared, marshes drained, waste lands 
reclaimed, rivers banked in and bridged, and the soil 
made so productive that Britain became known in 
Rome as the most important grain-producing and 
grain-exporting province in the empire. 

Where the Britons had had a humble village en- 
closed by a ditch, with felled trees to protect it, 
there rose walled cities, like Chester and Colchester, 



OF ENGLISH HISTORY. 15 

Lincoln and London, with some three-score more, all 
acknowledging York as their capital; for there, in 
the imperial palace, Constantine was crowned, and 
there, defended by ramparts and forts, were temples, 
baths and a forum, which might recall those on the 
banks of the Tiber. 

The province was divided into five districts, inter- 
sected with a magnificent system of paved and 
macadamized roads, running in direct lines from city 
to city, and having London as a common centre. 
On the north, England was shielded against the in- 
cursions of barbarians from Scotland, by two massive 
walls of solid masonry, strengthened by earthworks, 
which extended across the country for eighty miles 
from the shore of the North to that of the Irish Sea. 
These walls were further defended by castles built at 
regular intervals of one mile and constantly garri- 
soned, while at every fourth mile was a fort, 
covering an area of several acres and occupied by a 
large body of troops. So much still remains of these 
cities, walls and fortresses that, as a recent writer 
has said, "outside of England no such monuments 
exist of the power and military genius of Rome." 1 

Yet the whole fabric was as hollow and as false as 
it was splendid. Civilization, like truth, cannot be 
forced on minds unwilling or unable to receive it — 

1 Scarth, Roman Britain. 



16 THE LEADING FACTS 

least of all can it be forced by the sword's point, and 
the taskmaster's lash. 

In order to render his victories secure on the con- 
tinent, Caesar had not hesitated to butcher thousands 
of prisoners of war, and to cut off the right hands of 
whole populations to prevent their rising in revolt. 
The policy pursued in Britain, though very different, 
was equally heartless and equally fatal. The mass 
of the inhabitants were virtually slaves. Their work 
was in the brick-fields, the quarries, the mines, or in 
the ploughed land and the forest. Their homes were 
wretched cabins, chinked in with mud, thatched 
with straw, and built on the estates of masters who 
paid no wages, who lived in stately villas, adorned 
with tessellated pavements and frescoed walls, 
warmed in winter like our modern houses, with cur- 
rents of heated air, and opening in summer on 
terraces ornamented with vases and statuary, and on 
gardens of fruits and flowers. 

Such was the condition of the serfs, while those 
who were nominally free were hardly better off, 
since all that they earned was swallowed up in taxes 
and tribute. " One heard nothing," says a writer of 
that time, 1 speaking of the days when revenue was 
collected, "but the sound of flogging and all kinds of 

1 Lactantius, quoted in Elton's Origins of English History, and 
compare the speech of Galgacus in Tacitus. 



OF ENGLISH HISTORY. 17 

torture. The son was compelled to inform against 
his father, and the wife against her husband; all 
other means failing, men were forced to give evi- 
dence against themselves, and were assessed accord- 
ing to the confession which they made to escape 
torment." This vast system of organized oppression, 
which, like all systems of oppression was "not so 
much an institution as a destitution," lasted until 
the whirligig of time brought its revenge, and Rome, 
which had crushed so many nations of barbarians, 
was, in her turn, threatened with like fate by hordes 
of barbarians stronger than herself. When that 
danger was imminent, she recalled her legions from 
Britain, and her colonists there soon followed. In 
the year 409, we find this brief but expressive en- 
try in the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle : " After this the 
Romans never ruled in Britain." And again, a few 
years later, this entry occurs: "418, this year the 
Romans collected all the treasures that were in 
Britain, and some they hid in the earth so that no 
one since has been able to find them, and some they 
carried with them to Gaul." 

In the course of the next three generations all 

that Roman civilization had accomplished in the 

island had so completely faded out and disappeared, 

that except a few words, like " port " and " street," 1 

1 " Via strata " and " portus." 



18 THE LEADING FACTS 

which have come down to us, nothing was left but 
the material shell, the forts, bastions, walls, arches, 
gateways, altars, and tombs, which are still to be seen 
throughout the land. The rest, if any there be, is so 
intangible and uncertain that it is only a subject for 
historians and antiquarians to wrangle over, 1 and 
were it not for the stubborn evidence of piles of 
stone, and ivy-covered ruins, like those of Pevensey, 
Chester, and York, one might well doubt whether 
the time had ever really been when the Caesars held 
England in their relentless grasp. 

1 Scarth, Pearson, Guest, Elton, and Coote believe that Roman 
civilization had a permanent influence ; while Lappenburg, Stubbs, 
Freeman, Green, Wright, and Gardiner deny it. 



OF ENGLISH HISTORY. 19 



IV. 



"The happy ages of history are never the productive ones." 

Hegel. 



-OO^&^OO- 



THE COMING OF THE SAXONS OR ENGLISH, A.D. 449. 

THE BATTLES OF THE TRIBES. 

The Age of Conflict. — Laying the Corner-Stone op 
England, 449-1066. 

Three hundred and fifty years of Roman "law 
and order " had so completely tamed the fiery abo- 
rigines of the island, that when the legions abandoned 
it, the complaint of Gildas, " the British Jeremiah," 
as Gibbon calls him, may have been literally true, 
when he declared that the Britons were no longer 
brave in war or faithful in peace. Certain it is that 
they were unable to protect themselves against the 
incursions of the Picts on the north, to whom the 
walls of Hadrian and Antoninus had ceased to be for- 
midable obstacles when the garrisons had left the 
forts vacant. 

In 446 the chief men of the country joined in a 
piteous and pusillanimous letter begging help from 
Rome, and addressed as follows : " To ^Etius, consul 



20 THE LEADING FACTS 

for the third time — the groans of the Britons." 
Moved by these groans, the consul sent a force which 
drove back the wild tribes from the north ; but it was 
a last effort, and from that date the province was left 
to shift- for itself as best it might. 

The method finally adopted by the Britons was to 
invite a band of Saxon pirates to help them repel 
the invaders, — thus " fighting fire with fire." The 
monk Gildas records their arrival in characteristic 
terms, saying that "in 449 a multitude of whelps 
came from the lair of the barbaric lioness, in three 
keels, as they call them." We get a good picture 
of what they were like from the exultant song of 
their countryman Beowulf, who describes with pride 
the dragon-prowed ships, filled with sea-robbers, 
armed with rough-handled spears and swords of 
bronze, coming from the peninsula of Jutland to 
the shining coasts of Britain. 

These three " keels," under the command of the 
chieftains Hengist and Horsa, were destined to grow 
into a kingdom. Settling at first, according to 
agreement, in the island of Thanet, near the mouth 
of the Thames, they easily fulfilled their contract to 
free the country from the ravages of the Picts, and 
quite as easily found a pretext afterward for seizing 
the fairest portion of Kent for themselves and for 
their kinsmen and adherents who came, vulture-like, 



OF ENGLISH HISTORY. 21 

in ever-increasing multitudes. Year by year they 
extended their conquests. Scorning to take posses- 
sion of what Rome had left, they burnt the villas, 
drove out or killed the serfs, and appropriated the 
land to their own use. Later, they attacked even 
the walled towns, with what result we may learn 
from the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle, which tersely says, 
that "in 490 Ella and Cissa besieged Anderida" (the 
modern Pevensey) " and put to death all who inhab- 
ited it, so that not a single Briton remained alive 
in it." 

Thirty years after, they received their first check 
at Badbury in Dorsetshire, from that famous Arthur, 
the legend of whose deeds has come down to us 
in the pages of Jeffrey of Monmouth, and is retold in 
Tennyson's " Idylls of the King." He met them in 
their march of insolent triumph, and with his sword 
" Excalibar " and his staunch Welsh spearsmen, 
proved to them at least that he was a man and no 
myth — able " to break the heathen and uphold the 
Christ." But though temporarily brought to a 
stand, the heathen were not to be either expelled 
or exterminated; on the contrary, they had come 
to stay, and at last the Britons were forced to take 
refuge among the hills of Wales, where they con- 
tinued to abide, unconquered and unconquerable by 
force alone. In the light of these events, it is inter- 



22 THE LEADING FACTS 

esting to see that that ancient stock never lost 
its love of liberty, and that more than eleven cen- 
turies later, Roger Williams, Thomas Jefferson, and 
several of the fifty-five signers of The Declaration 
of American Independence were either of Welsh 
birth or of direct Welsh descent. 

The next eighty years — until the coming of 
Augustine — is a dreary period of constant blood- 
shed. Out of their very barbarism, however, a re- 
generating influence was to arise. In their greed 
for gain, some of the Saxons did not hesitate to 
sell their own children into bondage. A number 
of these slaves, exposed in the Roman forum, at- 
tracted the attention, as he was passing, of a monk 
named Gregory. Struck with the beauty of their 
clear, ruddy complexions and fair hair, he enquired 
from what country they came. " They are Angles," 
was the dealer's answer. " No, not Angles, but 
angels," answered the monk ; and he resolved that 
should he ever have the power, he would send mis- 
sionaries to convert a race of so much promise. In 
597, when he became head of the Church of Rome, 
he fulfilled his resolution, and the Abbot Augus- 
tine, with a band of forty monks, landed on the 
very spot where Hengist and Horsa had disem- 
barked a hundred years before. They, too, brought 
with them the power of Rome, but this time it came, 



OF ENGLISH HISTORY. 23 

not as a force from without to crush men in an 
iron mould of submission and uniformity, but as a 
persuasive voice speaking from within to rouse and 
cheer them with new hope. By that still, small 
voice the island was won over to a civilization, which, 
once planted, has never failed. 

The chief, or rather king, of Kent — for " war had 
begot the king " — listened to Augustine, was con- 
verted and renounced the worship of Thor and 
Woden, gods of storm and slaughter. In like man- 
ner, when a little band of monks penetrated Nor- 
thumbria and begged leave to speak, an aged chief 
arose in the assembly and said, " O, king, as a bird 
flies through this hall in the winter night, coming 
out of the darkness and vanishing into darkness 
again, even such is our life. If these strangers 
can tell us aught of what is beyond, let us give 
heed to them." So, gradually, the new teaching 
gained ground, until what Schiller wrote became as 
true of England as of Greece, and it could be said : — 

" The intelligible forms of ancient poets, 
The fair humanities of old religion, 
The power, the beauty, and the majesty 
That had their haunts in dale or piny mountain 
Or forest, by slow stream or pebbly spring, 
Or chasms and watery depths, — all these have vanished. 
They live no longer in the faith of reason." 



24 THE LEADING FACTS 

Christianity organized itself under monastic rule ; 
and the monks, whose motto of " Laborare est 
orare " meant then, as Carlyle has shown in "Past 
and Present," actual work, and not mere words, set 
themselves, with a will, to clear the land anew, to 
build, to plough, to plant, to reap, as well as to 
teach and to preach. 

Under their zealous labors, each monastery became, 
like Whitby and St. Albans, a centre of light. 
Schools were opened, art was cultivated, libraries 
were founded. Then the poet Caedmon, as Free- 
man tells us, "a thousand years before Milton, 
dealt with Milton's theme in Milton's spirit." Then 
Gildas and Bede wrote, in rude Latin, the first 
page of British history ; and then the Anglo-Saxon 
Chronicle, the true beginning of pure literature 
in the English tongue, " continued that national 
history in the national spirit." * 

The culmination of that period was in Alfred, 
fitly called Alfred the Great, since he was the em- 
bodiment of whatever was best and bravest in the 
English character. The key-note of his life may 
be found in the words he spoke at the close of it : 
" So long as I have lived, I have striven to live 
worthily." When he came to the throne in 871, 
the Danes were sweeping down on the north-eastern 

1 Gardiner's Introduction to English History. 



OF ENGLISH HISTORY. 25 

coast of the island, pillaging, destroying, murdering. 
The monasteries on account of their wealth, or sup- 
posed wealth, and their helplessness, were the especial 
objects of attack ; and with good reason the fright- 
ened monks of that day added to their usual litany 
the petition, " From the fury of the North-men, good 
Lord, deliver us." The answer to that fervent 
prayer was Alfred's valor. After repeated defeats, 
he finally drove back the savage hordes, " who 
thought it a shame to earn by sweat what they could 
win by blood," 1 whose boast was that they would 
fight in Paradise, even as they had fought on earth, 
and would celebrate their victories there with foam- 
ing draughts of ale, drunk from the skulls of those 
they had slain. 

The site of the victory in Berkshire is still marked 
by the colossal figure of a white horse cut on the 
side of a chalk-hill, to commemorate the battle 
gained by those who carried the standard of the 
White Horse, — the ensign of the Saxons of Kent, 
then and now. 

But the end was not yet. The war continued 
with varying fortunes during seven more years, 
when Alfred, having with his forces surrounded the 
entrenched camp of the enemy at Edington, fairly 
starved them into submission — a submission so com- 

1 Tacitus. 



26 THE LEADING FACTS 

plete that the Danish leader offered not only to 
swear a peace, but to seal the oath with his baptism. 
By that treaty of Wedmore, the Danes bound them- 
selves to remain north and east of a line drawn 
from London to Chester, following the line of the 
old Roman road called Watling Street. 1 All south 
thereof, including London and a large section of 
country round it on the north, was recognized as 
the dominions of Alfred, whose chief city, or capital, 
was Winchester ; and as by this treaty the Danes 
acknowledged him as over-lord, Alfred became nomi- 
nally what Egbert, his predecessor, had claimed to 
be, the king of the whole country. 

He proved himself more than that, for he was 
lawgiver and educator beside. Through his efforts 
a written code was compiled, prefaced by the ten 
commandments and ending with the Golden Rule. 
Wiser or juster code no people has had before or 
since. Next, that learning might not utterly per- 
ish in the ashes of the abbeys and monasteries which 
the Danes had destroyed, the king, though feeble 
and often suffering, set himself to translate the 
writings of Bede the historian, and afterward the 
reflections of the Roman senator Boethius, on the 
supreme good, — an enquiry written by him while 
in prison under sentence of death. 

1 See Section XII. 1, Treaty of Wedmore. 



OF ENGLISH HISTORY. 27 

Under Alfred's equitable rule the first decided 
step was taken in national consolidation, and 
about the close of the tenth century the various 
tribes of Angles, Jutes, Saxons and Danes, adopt- 
ing the first name, called the land England, a word 
which may be traced to that little district of Angeln 
in Schleswig-Holstein, the southern part of the 
kingdom of Denmark, where the race originated. 
The best commentary on the life of the great king 
is found in the fact that in 1849 the people of Wan- 
tage, his native place, celebrated the thousandth 
anniversary of his birth, another proof that " what 
is excellent, as God lives, is permanent." 

Two generations after Alfred's death, Dunstan, 
the archbishop of Canterbury, the ablest man in an 
age when all statesmen were ecclesiastics, came 
forward to take up and push onward the work 
begun by the great king. He labored for strict 
monastic rule and for the celibacy of the monks, at 
a time when celibacy was necessarily connected 
with important reforms and with the advancement 
of intellectual culture. He labored also, with tem- 
porary success, to reconcile the conflicting inter- 
ests of Danes and English, and also to repel further 
invasions. So clever was he as a theologian, a poli- 
tician, and even as a mechanic and artist, that it 
was popularly believed that in a personal contest 



28 THE LEADING FACTS 

with the Father of Lies, Dunstan did not fail to 
come off triumphant. 

With the close of Dunstan's career the period of 
decadence sets in. Fresh inroads began on the 
part of the Northmen, and so feeble and faint- 
hearted grew the resistance, that at last a yearly 
tax, the Danegeld, which in the outset had been 
levied for defence, was converted into a bribe to 
buy off the invaders. For a brief time this "sop 
to Cerberus" answered the purpose, but a time 
came when it proved useless. In 1013 Sweyn, 
the Dane, conquered England, "and all the people," 
says the Chronicle, " held Sweyn for full king." 1 
He was succeeded by Canute, who attacked the 
Scotch, and subdued "the gracious Duncan" of 
Shakespeare's Macbeth, and who, barbarian though 
he was, showed himself upright and a friend to all. 

The oppressive acts of his son brought on an in- 
surrection in which both races joined to restore the 
Saxon line. Edward the Confessor, then in Brit- 
tany, was invited to become ruler. Half Norman, 
as lie was by birth, he was wholly so in education 
and in tastes. He was a man of amiable excellence 
who neglected this world to win the other. Rightly 
reputed a saint in his day, and hence called the 
"Confessor," we see his work in the crypt of West- 
1 Anglo-Saxon Chronicle. 



OF ENGLISH HISTORY. 29 

minster abbey, while 1 Lis* tomb above is the centre 
around which lies a circle of royal graves. To it, 
multitudes made pilgrimage in olden time; and 
once in every year a little band of devoted Roman 
Catholics still gather about it in veneration of vir- 
tues which would have adorned a cloister but had 
not breadth and vigor to fill a throne. 

With Edward, save for the short interlude of Har- 
old, the last of the Saxon kings, and " the ablest 
man of an unprogressive race," the period closes. 

The Anglo-Saxons had laid the corner-stone of 
the English nation, but the superstructure was to 
be the work of a different people, who were to 
bring in new and needed elements. In its solid, 
fundamental qualities England remains what the 
Anglo-Saxons made it. They gave, first of all, 
the; language, simple, strong, direct and plain — 
the familiar speech of the street and of the fireside, 
— the speech of Bunyan and of the Bible. Next, 
they gave constitutional monarchy, parliament, and 
trial by jury, together with those principles, which 
were afterward revived and embodied in the Great 
Charter. Last and best, the Anglo-Saxons furnished 
the conservative patience, the calm, steady effort, 
the tenacious purpose and the cool, determined 
courage which have won famous and glorious 
battle-fields on both sides the Atlantic. 



30 THE LEADING FACTS 



V. 



"In other countries the struggle lias been to gain liberty; in 
England, to preserve it." — Alison. 

CK3^K^O« 



THE COMING OF THE NORMANS. 
THE KING VERSUS THE BARONS. 

buildixg the norman superstructure. the age op 

Feudalism. 

NOBMAN SOVEBEIGNS. 

William I., 1066-1087. . Henry I., 1100-1135. 

William II, 1087-1100. Stephen (house of Blois), 1135-1154. 

The Britons degenerated, as we have seen, 
through Roman tyranny ; the Saxons, through too 
great prosperity. Stow, in his "Annals of Eng- 
land," speaking of the condition of the people just 
before the Norman conquest, says, " The vices of 
the Saxons made them effeminate and womanish, 
wherefore it came to pass that running against Duke 
William they lost themselves and their country, 
with one, and that an easie and light battaile." 



OF ENGLISH HISTORY. 31 

The real cause, however, is to be sought deeper. 
What rendered the conquest possible was the lack 
of unity which characterized England at that time. 
Had not Harold's own brother turned traitorously 
against him at a critical moment, or had the North 
Country stood squarely by the South, the expedition 
from Normandy would, very probably, have ended 
in the discomfiture of the invaders. 
William, I 11 the autumn of 1066, William, who 

1066-1087. claimed that both his cousin, Edward the 
Confessor, and Harold had pledged to him the Eng- 
lish throne, demanded the fulfilment of the promise. 
On Harold's refusal to abdicate in his favor, he 
fitted out a large force of cavalry and archers, 
consisting partly of his own men and partly of hired 
troops to the number of 60,000, 1 and " landed on the 
gorse-clad downs of Pevensey, where stood and still 
stand the ruins of a Roman fortress, the last relic 
of a great city destroyed by the Saxons when they 
obtained possession of Britain." 

After a sanguinary fight, William's strategy de- 
cided the day, and Harold and his brave men found 
to their cost, that " it is the thinking bayonet which 
conquers." There, a few years later, the Norman 
general built the abbey of Battle to commemorate 
the victory by which he gained his crown ; and there, 

1 The estimates of William's army vary from 14,000 to 60,000. 



32 THE LEADING FACTS 

too, tradition represents him as burying Harold's 
body under a heap of stones by the sea-shore : so 
that standing by that cairn to-day, we seem to be 
standing by the grave of the Old England. The 
earliest and the best history of the battle is that 
wrought by a woman's hand in the scenes of the 
famous Bayeux Tapestry. 

Soon after the battle, William advanced on Lon- 
don, which, cut off by his army from help from the 
north, and terrified by the Hames of the Southwark 
suburbs which he had tired, surrendered without a 
blow. In return, the new ruler granted to the in- 
habitants a charter ; and among the archives of 
Guildhall may be seen a narrow strip of parchment, 
not bigger than a man's hand, containing a few lines 
of English, and signed with William's mark. — for 
he who wielded the sword so effectually had not 
learned to handle the pen, — by which mark all the 
past privileges and immunities of the city were 
confirmed. 1 

On the following Christmas-day, William was 
anointed and crowned in Westminster abbey. But 
the country was not at peace, and for four years 
there were outbreaks and uprisings in the fens of 
Lincolnshire and on the moors of Yorkshire, beside 
incursions of both Danes and Scots. 

1 See Section XII. ±, William's Charter. 



OF ENGLISH HISTORY. 33 

Little by little, however, the land was brought to 
obedience. By forced marches in midwinter, by 
means of roads cast up through bogs, and by sud- 
den night-attacks, William accomplished the end 
he sought. When all seemed finished, news came 
of a fresh revolt in the north, accompanied by 
another invasion of foreign barbarians. Then Wil- 
liam, roused to terrible anger, swore " by the splen- 
dor of God," that he would lay waste the land. He 
made good his oath. For a hundred miles beyond 
the Humber he ravaged the country, firing villages, 
destroying houses, crops and cattle, and reducing 
the wretched people to such destitution that many 
sold themselves for slaves to escape starvation. 
Stern measures, these, and pitiless, but better even 
these than that all England should sink into anarchy 
or into subjection to hordes of Norsemen, who de- 
stroyed purely out of love of destruction and hatred 
of civilization and its works. For, whatever Wil- 
liam's faults or crimes, his great object was the 
upbuilding of a system of government better than 
any that England had yet seen. Hence his severity, 
hence his elaborate safeguards, by which he made 
sure of retaining his hold on whatever he gained. 
We have seen that he gave London a charter. But 
overlooking the place in which that charter was 
kept, he built the tower of London to hold the 



34 THE LEADING FACTS 

turbulent city in wholesome restraint. That tower, 
as fortress, palace and prison, stands as the back- 
ground of nearly all the darkest events in English 
history. It was the progenitor, so to speak, of the 
multitude of castles and strongholds which soon 
after rose on the banks of every river and on the 
summit of every rocky height, from the west hill 
of Hastings to the Peak of Derbyshire, and from 
the banks of the Thames to the Dee. 

Considering his love of power and his strength 
of will, the reign of William the Conqueror was 
conspicuous for its justice. Save the appropriation 
of the New Forest, an extensive tract of sterile soil 
with here and there an oasis, which he took for a 
hunting-ground, and for that purpose despoiled, there 
are few discreditable acts to be charged against him. 

Not quite twenty years after his coronation, Wil- 
liam ordered a survey and valuation to be made of 
all the land in the realm outside of London except- 
ing three border counties, that were sparsely popu- 
lated by a mixed race, or that, since the "wasting 
of the North,"' had nothing to record since the days 
when they were filled with heaps of smouldering 
ruins and ridges of newly-made graves. Through 
the exhaustive returns of that survey, known as 
Domesday Book, the exact military and financial 
condition of the kingdom was exhibited and ren- 
dered directly available for revenue and defence. 



OF ENGLISH HISTORY. 35 

In the midsummer following its completion Wil- 
liam summoned the nobles and landholders of the 
entire country, to the number of over sixty thou- 
sand, to meet him on Salisbury Plain. 

There was a logical connection between that sum- 
moning and the survey. The census which had 
been taken furnished an accurate account of each 
man's possessions, and therefore of each man's re- 
sponsibility. It thus prepared the way for the 
assembly and for the action that was to be taken 
there. The place chosen was historic ground, for 
on that field William had once reviewed his victo- 
rious troops, and in the centre of the encampment 
rose the hill of Old Sarum scarred with the remains 
of Roman entrenchments. Stonehenge was near. 
There, within sight of the burial mounds of prime- 
val races, which had there had a home during the 
childhood of the world, the Norman sovereign fin- 
ished his work by demanding and receiving the 
sworn allegiance, not only of every lord, but of 
every lord's vassal, from Cornwall to the Scottish 
border. By this act England was made one. A 
score of years before William had landed seeking a 
throne to which no human law had given him just 
claim, but to which Nature had elected him by 
pre-ordained decree when she endowed him with 
power to take, power to use, and power to hold. 



36 THE LEADING FACTS 

It was fortunate for England that lie came, for out 
of chaos, or affairs fast drifting to chaos, his strong 
hand, clear brain and resolute purpose brought 
order, beauty, safety and stability ; so that we may 
say with Guizot that "England owes her liberties to 
her having been conquered by the Norman." 

In less than a year from that meeting, William 
was in Normandy endeavoring to quell a rebellion 
led by his son. As he rode down a steep street in 
Mantes, his horse stumbled, and he received a fatal 
injury. He was carried to the Priory of Saint 
Gervaise, just outside the city of Rouen. Early 
in the morning he was awakened by the great 
cathedral bell. " It is the hour of praise," his 
attendant said to him, " when the priests give 
thanks for the new day." William lifted up his 
hands — and expired. 

The results of the Conquest may be thus summed 
up : — 

I. It brought England into closer contact with 
the higher civilization of the continent ; introduced 
fresh intellectual stimulus, and gave to the Anglo- 
Saxon race a more progressive spirit. 

II. It changed the English language by the influ- 
ence of the Norman-French elements, and thus gave 
it greater flexibility, refinement and elegance of 
expression. 



OF ENGLISH HISTORY. 37 

III. It substituted for the fragile and decaying 
structures of wood built by the Saxons, noble 
Gothic edifices in stone — the cathedral and the 
castle both being essentially Norman. 

IV. It hastened consolidating influences, already 
at work; developed and completed the feudal form 
of land-tenure; and defined the relation of the state 
to the papal power. 

V. It abolished the four great earldoms of the 
Saxon period, which had been a constant source of 
weakness, danger and division ; and established a 
strong monarchical government, to which the nobles 
were compelled to swear allegiance, and which en- 
forced obedience to the law among all classes. 
William Rufus When the Conqueror realized that his 
1087-noo. hurt was mortal, he called his sons to 
his bedside, and bequeathed Normandy to Robert, 
the eldest, and England to his younger brother, 
William Rufus. 

Robert's recent rebellion would, alone, have been 
sufficient reason for allotting to him the lesser por- 
tion ; but even had he deserved the sceptre, William 
knew that it required a firmer hand than his to hold 
it. France was "a divided collection of independ- 
ent baronies." The reckless ambition of the Nor- 
man leaders who had fought at Hastings threatened 
to bring England into the same condition. During 
the twenty-one years of William's reign they had 



38 THE LEADING FACTS 

repeatedly tried to break loose from his restraining 
power. It was certain, then, that the news of his 
death would be the signal for still more desperate at- 
tempts. William Rufus had his father's ability and 
his father's resolution, with far less than his father's 
conscience. As the historian of that day declared, 
He feared God but little — man, not at all. He 
had Csesar's faith in destiny, and said to the boatman 
who hesitated to set off in a storm at his command, 
Did yon ever hear of a king's being drowned? 

During the greater part of the thirteen years of 
his reign he was at war with his barons. It was a 
battle of centralization against disintegration. Had 
not the English people rallied to his help at Roches- 
ter, the latter would probably have gained the day. 
But of the two evils — the tyranny of one or the 
tyranny of many — the first seemed preferable. . 

If in some respects William the Conqueror had 
been a harsh ruler, his son was worse. Like Reho- 
boam of old, his little finger was thicker than his 
father's loins. His brother Robert had mortgaged 
Normandy to him to get money to join the first 
Crusade. The king raised it by heavy taxation. 
He robbed the Church of its income, insulted its 
ministers, and held such orgies in his palace, and 
even in the great hall which he built .at Westmin- 
ster, that those who took part in them were ashamed 
to speak of them. His one merit was that he kept 



OF ENGLISH HISTOKY. 39 

England from being devoured piecemeal by those who 
regarded her as a pack of hounds in full chase regards 
the hare about falling into their rapacious jaws. 

In 1100 his power came suddenly to an end. He 
had gone in the morning to hunt in the New Forest ; 
— he was found lying dead among the bushes, 
pierced by an arrow, shot by an unknown hand. 
Henry I, Henry was the first of the Norman kings 

1100-1135. who was born and educated in England. 
Foreseeing a renewal of the contest with the barons, 
he issued a charter of liberties, on his accession, by 
which he bound himself to reform the abuses which 
had been practised by his brother, William Rufus. 1 
As this was the earliest written and formal guar- 
antee of good government, given by the crown to 
the nation, it marks an important epoch in English 
history. It was a virtual admission that the time 
had come when even a Norman sovereign could not 
dispense with the support of the country, and hence 
an admission of the truth that while a people can 
exist without a king, no king can exist without a 
people. Furthermore this charter established a pre- 
cedent for those which were to follow, and which 
reached a final development in the Great Charter 
wrested from the unwilling hand of John, some- 
what more than a century later. 

1 Por the substance of this Charter, see Section XII. 7. 



40 THE LEADING FACTS 

Henry strengthened his position by his marriage 
with the "good queen Maude," niece of the Saxon 
Edgar Atheling, and, with the aid of troops fur- 
nished by the country, he defeated and expelled 
Robert of Belesme, Earl of Shrewsbury, 1 the most 
powerful of the mutinous barons, and, crossing the 
channel, he fought the battle of Tenchenbray, by 
which he conquered Normandy, then in revolt, as 
completely as Normandy had once conquered Eng- 
land. By his uprightness, his decision, his courage, 
lie fairly won the honorable title of "the Lion of 
Justice," for, as the Chronicle records, No man durst 
mis-do against another in his time. 
Stephen, With Henry's death two candidates pre- 

1135-1154. gented themselves for the throne : Henry's 
daughter Matilda — for he left no lawful son — 
and his nephew Stephen. It was a maxim of the 
Salic law of Prance that the crown should never 
descend to a female, and in an age when the sover- 
eign was expected to lead his army in person, it was 
not expedient that a woman should hold a position 
one of whose chief duties she could not discharge. 
For the sake of promoting discord, and through dis- 
cord their own private ends, part of the barons gave 
their support to Matilda, while the rest refused, as 
they said, to "hold their estates under a distaff." 

1 See Ordericus Vitalis. XI. '■). 



OF ENGLISH HISTORY. 41 

The fatal defect in the new king — for Stephen 
had assumed the crown — was the absence of execu- 
tive ability. Following the example of Henry, he 
issued two charters ; but without authority to make 
them good, they proved to be only waste paper. 
For nineteen years the country was torn by civil 
war. While it raged, fortified castles, which under 
William the Conqueror had been sternly repressed, 
arose on every side, and they became, as the Anglo- 
Saxon Chronicle declares, "very nests of devils and 
dens of thieves." The armed bands who inhabited 
them levied tribute on the whole country around. 
Not satisfied with that, they seized those who were 
suspected of having property, and, in the words of 
the Chronicle, " tortured them with pains unspeaka- 
ble ; for some they hung up by the feet and smoked 
with foul smoke ; others they crushed in a narrow 
chest with sharp stones ; about the heads of others 
they bound knotted cords until they went into the 
brain." " By such deeds the land was ruined," writes 
the monk of Peterborough ; and " men said openly 
that Christ and his saints were asleep." : The sleep, 
however, was not to last, for in the next reign 
Justice, in the person of Henry II., effectually vin- 
dicated its power. 

1 Peterborough : continuation of the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle. 



42 THE LEADING FACTS 



VI. 



"Man bears within him certain ideas of order, of justice, of 
reason, with a certain desire to bring them into play . . . ; for this 
he labors unceasingly." — Guizot, Hist, of Civilization. 



a'^oo- 



THE ANGEVINS, OR PLAXTAGEXETS, 1154-1399. 

THE BARONS VERSUS THE CROWN. 

Consolidation of Norman and Saxon Interests. — Rise or 
the English Nation. 

Henry II., 1154-1189. Edward I., 1272-1307. 

Richard I., 1189-1199. Edward II., 1307-1327. 

John, 1199-1216. Edward III., 1327-1377. 

Henry III., 1216-1272. Richard II., 1377-1399. 

Henry II., By the treaty of Wallingford, made in 

1154-1189. the last year of his life, Stephen had 
agreed that, at his death, Matilda's son Henry, then 
of age, should succeed to the crown provided he 
renounced all claim to it at any earlier time. 
Through his mother, and the dowry received with 
his wife, Henry inherited the whole of western 
France, so that on his accession to the throne he 
found himself in possession of a realm extending 



OF ENGLISH HISTORY. 43 

from the borders of Scotland to the base of the 
Pyrenees. To this he added Ireland, which, unfor- 
tunately, only partially conquered, and still more 
unfortunately, seldom if ever justly ruled, has since 
remained, in Macaulay's expressive phrase, " a with- 
ered and distorted, member of the United Kingdom." 
To Henry's summons to furnish troops for an expedi- 
tion on the continent, the barons returned a refusal, 
alleging that they were not bound to military ser- 
vice out of England. The king wisely proposed a 
compromise, and offered to accept a moderate com- 
mutation in money, technically called scutage or 
shield-money. The proposal was accepted, and the 
means were thus furnished to hire soldiers for wars 
abroad. Later he supplemented this by obtaining 
the passage of a law entitled the Assize of Arms, 
which revived the national militia and placed them 
under his command for home service. By these two 
measures Henry made himself practically independ- 
ent of feudal service, and in doing so gained pos- 
session of a greater degree of power than had been 
held by any previous ruler. 

He was also the first of the kings of England who 
successfully established a great judicial and legal 
administrative system. By that system the country 
was divided into six circuits nearly corresponding 
to those of the present day. Eighteen judges, or 



44 THE LEADING FACTS 

itinerant justices, were sent out over these circuits 
to try all cases brought before them on appeal from 
the county and baronial courts, both of which, says 
Sir Matthew Hale, had become places where every 
species of corruption and intimidation were prac- 
tised. In this way the king's court was brought 
to every man's door, and before that tribunal suitors 
might hope for an impartial hearing. 

In addition to this, Henry instituted a grand jury 
to examine criminal cases and present them to the 
itinerant justices ; and by the Assize : of Clarendon 
he provided that those who objected to the Nor- 
man method of deciding disputes by a battle or duel 
between the contestants, should have the privilege 
of referring the matter to a civil jury. 

Henry's second great measure, the Constitu- 
tions 2 of Clarendon, — so called because passed at 
the king's hunting seat at Clarendon park, — enacted 
that ecclesiastics charged with crime should no 
longer be tried in their own, but in the civil courts, 
in order that all classes should be equal before the 
law. In the reign of William I. the Church had been 
allowed separate jurisdiction. Flagrant abuses had 
grown out of this privilege, and in Henry's time not 
only monks and clergymen claimed immunity from 

1 Assize, i.e., law or statute. 

2 Constitutions, i.e., laws or enactments. 



OF ENGLISH HISTORY. 45 

the secular courts, but multitudes of others, whose 
only evidence of sanctity was that they wore the 
tonsure. 

Thomas Becket, archbishop of Canterbury, was 
utterly opposed to the change, and stoutly resisted. 
The king insisted, and swore by " God's eyes " that 
the law should be enforced; Becket, equally deter- 
mined, swore by " his reverence for those eyes " that 
it should not. " Then was seen the mournful spec- 
tacle," says a champion of the Church of that day, 
" of priests and deacons who had committed murder, 
manslaughter, robbery, theft and other crimes, car- 
ried in carts before the commissioners, and punished 
as if they had been ordinary men." Becket, finding 
that Henry was firm, left the kingdom in a rage, and 
Henry, who was equally passionate, forthwith ban- 
ished all the archbishop's relatives and friends, 
without regard to age or sex, to the number of 
nearly four hundred. Becket retorted by hurling 
that awful anathema of excommunication at the 
king's chief counsellors, which declares those on 
whom it rests accursed of God and of man, deprived 
of help in this world and shut out from hope in the 
world to come. After several years a reconciliation 
was effected, and Becket returned. But soon the 
contest was renewed, and in an unguarded moment 
Henry exclaimed, Who will rid me of that turbu- 



46 THE LEADING FACTS 

lent priest ? In answer to the king's angry cry for 
relief, four knights set off at once, without his knowl- 
edge, for Canterbury, and brutally murdered the 
archbishop within the walls of the cathedral. That 
murder caused the canonization of Becket, who was 
regarded as a martyr in the cause of the Church. 
The stone pavement around his shrine shows, by the 
hollows worn in it, where thousands of pilgrims crept 
on their knees to pray for his intercession. 

Henry was so far vanquished that he had to relin- 
quish all attempts to render the clergy amenable to 
the state ; but, in making the attempt, he had sowed 
the seed which was to bear fruit in a later gener- 
tion. 

While absent in Normandy, the king received tid- 
ings of a formidable revolt by the Duke of Norfolk 
and the Bishop of Durham. Hastening to England, 
he stopped at Canterbury to do penance at the 
tomb of the man whom his hasty words had slain. 
There he bowed in abject humiliation, and was 
beaten with rods, like the vilest criminal, in expia- 
tion of his sin. Meanwhile his faithful adherents 
had rallied and suppressed the rebellion ; and with 
it the struggle between the crown and the barons, 
which had lasted just one hundred years, came to 
an end, — never to be renewed in that form; since 
it was then settled that England was not to be 



OF ENGLISH HISTORY. 47 

divided as a spoil among the great land-owners, but 
was to be governed as a whole by one central power. 

Henry's last days were embittered by the unfaith- 
fulness of his sons. He trusted John, who was the 
youngest; but when peace had been made with 
France, and the king asked to see a list of the 
names of those who had conspired against him, 
John's name stood first. That blow was mortal : a 
few days later the old man died, broken-hearted, — 
his work only half done, but that half was done to 
last, and it has left its beneficent marks to this day 
on the English constitution and laws. 
Richard L, Henry II. was succeeded by his second 

1189-1199. son? Richard, known as Richard Cceur de 
Lion, for his love of battle and adventure, but who 
might better be known as the absentee king, since 
of a nominal reign of ten years he spent but about 
six months in England; the remaining time being 
consumed in wars abroad. 

The condition of society during that period is 
admirably presented in Walter Scott's novel of 
Ivanhoe, wherein every class appears — from the 
Saxon serf and swineherd, wearing his brazen col- 
lar, the outlaw, Robin Hood, in Sherwood forest, 
the baron in his castle torturing Jews to extort 
their gold, and the mail-clad kniglits riding tour- 
neys at Ashby-de-la-Zouche. 



48 THE LEADING FACTS 

Since the Conquest, our sympathy has all been 
for the king; we have watched him struggling 
against the lawless nobles, and every gain he has 
made in power, we have felt to be so much won 
for the cause of good government. But we are 
coming to a period when our sympathies will be 
the other way. 1 The power of the throne had now 
reached a point where it became arbitrary, and 
the welfare of the nation depends henceforth on 
the resistance of those who formerly menaced its 
safety. 

We have seen that in order to raise money to 
join the Crusades, Robert of Normandy pawned 
his dukedom to his brother Rufus. With the same 
object, Richard sold offices and dignities to the 
highest bidder, and granted many charters to towns 
on the same terms, saying, with an oath, to one of 
his court who remonstrated with him, that " he 
would sell London itself if he could find a 
buyer." 

The third Crusade was a failure, and Richard, on 
his way home, was seized and held captive by his 
enemy, the emperor of Austria. John, who had 
remained in England, plotted with Philip of France 
to keep his brother in prison while he got possession 
of the throne. But, notwithstanding his efforts, 
1 Ransome, Rise of the English Constitution. 



OF ENGLISH HISTORY. 49 

Richard regained his liberty on condition of raising 
an enormous ransom. When the king of France 
heard of this, he wrote to John, Look out for 
yourself ; the devil has broke loose. But Richard 
passed over his brother's treason with contemptuous 
indifference, and John lived to gain a throne which 
he disgraced. 

The Crusades gave to England a few details of 
architectural ornament, like the Greek pattern one 
sees sculptured on the Norman arches of Iffley 
church, Oxford. It created also that fantastic 
science of heraldry which had its origin in the 
crosses painted on the shields of the knights. Had 
these been the chief results, they would have been 
but a sorry compensation for the blood spilled and 
treasure wasted in vain attempts to recover posses- 
sion of the sepulchre of Christ. But the real results 
were wholly different, and were perhaps worth all 
they cost. The full effect of the Crusades was seen, 
not in the benefits they conferred, but in the evils 
they removed. When they began, says Gibbon, 
the greater part of the inhabitants of Europe was 
chained to the soil, without freedom or property or 
knowledge, and the two orders, ecclesiastic and 
nobles, whose number was comparatively small, 
alone deserved the name of citizens and men. . . . 
Among the causes that undermined that Gothic 



50 THE LEADING FACTS 

edifice, a conspicuous place must be assigned to the 
Crusades. The estates of the barons were dissipated, 
and their race was often extinguished in these 
costly and perilous expeditions. Their poverty ex- 
torted from their pride those charters of freedom 
which unlocked the fetters of the slave, made secure 
the farm of the peasant and the shop of the artificer, 
and gradually restored a substance and a soul to 
the most numerous and useful part of the com- 
munity. 

The reign of John was occupied with 
1199-1216. three momentous quarrels : first with 
France, then with the pope, lastly with the barons. 
By the quarrel with France he lost Normandy, and 
became " John Lackland " ; by that with the pope 
he united the power of Church and nobles against 
himself ; and by that with the barons, he was forced 
to grant the Great Charter. 

Shortly after his accession, while he was at Rouen, 
his nephew, Arthur, a boy of twelve, mysteriously dis- 
appeared, or, as Matthew of Paris expressed it, "van- 
ished." Philip of France accused John of having 
murdered the lad, in order to remove a possible rival 
to the English throne ; and ordered the king, as Duke 
of Normandy, and hence his feudal vassal, to appear 
at Paris and answer for the crime. John refused, 
war was declared, and his French possessions were 



OF ENGLISH HISTORY. 51 

taken from him. From that time, says Macaulay, 
the Norman nobles were compelled to make their 
election between the island and the continent. Be- 
fore that time the Norman's contempt for the Saxon 
was so great that his most indignant exclamation 
was, Do yon take me for an Englishman? Now, 
shut in by the sea with the people he had hitherto 
oppressed and despised, he gradually came to re- 
gard England as his country, and Englishmen as 
his countrymen. The two races, so long hostile, 
soon found that they had common interests and 
common enemies. 

Two years after his defeat, John entered upon his 
second quarrel. Pope Innocent III. had commanded 
a delegation of the monks of Canterbury to choose 
Stephen Langton archbishop in place of the royal 
treasurer whom the king had compelled them to 
elect. When the news reached John, he forbade 
Langton's landing in England, though it was his 
native country. The pope forthwith declared the 
kingdom under an interdict. For five years the 
churches were hung in mourning, the bells ceased 
to ring, the doors were fast shut. For five years the 
priests denied the sacraments to the living and 
funeral prayers for the dead. At the end of that 
time the pope, by a bull of excommunication, cut off 
the king as a withered branch from the Church of 



52 THE LEADING FACTS 

Christ, and to render it the more effective, ordered 
Philip of France to seize England as his own. Then 
John, knowing that he stood alone, made a virtue 
of necessity, kneeled at the feet of the pope's legate, 
accepted Stephen Langton as archbishop, and prom- 
ised to pay a yearly tax to Rome if he might be per- 
mitted to keep his crown. Innocent was satisfied 
with the victory he had gained over his ignoble foe, 
and peace was made. 

But peace in one direction did not mean peace in 
all. John's tyranny, brutalit} T , and disregard of his 
subjects' rights had gone too far. Those who had 
suffered were determined to have reformation, and 
to have it in the form of a written pledge bearing 
the king's signature and seal. The new archbishop 
was not less determined. He no sooner landed than 
he demanded of the king that he should swear to 
" observe the laws of the Confessor " — a phrase in 
which the whole of the national liberties were 
summed up. 

In the summer of 1213, a council was held at St. 
Albans, composed of representatives from all parts 
of the kingdom. It was the first assembly of the 
kind on record, and it convened to consider what 
claims should be made on the king, in the interest 
both of the clergy and the country. Their delibera- 
tions took shape, perhaps under Langton's guid- 



OF ENGLISH HISTORY. 53 

ing hand, of a charter, framed after the model of 
charters already granted by Henry I. and Stephen, 
but in every respect fuller and stronger in its 
provisions. 

Late in the autumn of the following year, the 
barons met in the Abbey-church of Bury St. Ed- 
munds, under their leader, Robert Fitzwalter of 
London. Advancing, one by one, up the nave to 
the high altar, they solemnly swore that they would 
oblige John to grant the charter which the} r had 
drawn up or they would declare war against him. 

At Easter, 1215, the same barons, attended by 
two thousand armed knights, met the king near 
Oxford, and made known to him their demands. 
John tried to evade a direct answer. Seeing that to 
be impossible and finding that London was on the 
side of the barons, he yielded, and requested them to 
name a day and place for the ratification of the 
articles. Let the day be the 15th of June, the 
place Runnymede, was the reply. In accordance 
therewith we read at the foot of the shrivelled parch- 
ment, preserved in the British Museum, these words: 
" Given under our hand ... in the meadow called 
Runnymede, between Windsor and Staines, on the 
fifteenth day of June, in the seventeenth year of our 
reign." 

By the terms of that document, henceforth to be 



54 THE LEADING FACTS 

known as Magna Carta, it was stipulated that the 
following grievances should be redressed : (1) those 
of the Church; (2) those of the barons and their 
vassals ; (3) of freemen [and indirectly of serfs] ; 
(4) of cities and tradesmen. 

Of the sixty-three articles constituting the Great 
Charter most are now obsolete, but three possess 
imperishable value. These provide that no freeman 
shall be imprisoned or proceeded against except by 
the judgment of his peers or the law of the land; 
that justice shall neither be sold, denied, or delayed ; 
and that all dues from the people to the king, unless 
otherwise specified, shall be imposed only with the 
consent of the common council of the realm — an 
admirable expedient, says Mackintosh, by which 
the power of taxation was converted into the shield 
of liberty. Thus all classes, the clergy, the barons, 
the lower vassals and freeholders, even the mer- 
chants and the peasants, found their interests con- 
sulted, and, for the first time, the English people 
appear in constitutional history of the country as a 
united whole. 1 

So highly was this charter esteemed that down 
to the reign of Henry VI. it had been confirmed 
no less than thirty-seven times; and the very day 
that Charles II. entered London as a restored king, 
the commons asked him to confirm it again. 
1 Gardiner's Introduction ; and see Section XII. 12 — Magna Carta. 



OF ENGLISH HISTORY. 55 

The remainder of John's ignominious reign was 
an unsuccessful attempt to break loose from the 
bond he had given. " They have placed twenty- 
four kings over me," he said in his fury after he 
had signed the instrument — referring to the twenty- 
four barons who were appointed to see that the 
charter was not to become a dead letter. The 
twenty-four did their duty, and John tried in vain 
not to do his. In the midst of the struggle he 
died ; — a man of whom it has been said, " He was 
a knight without truth, a king without justice, and 
a Christian without faith." He was buried in 
Worcester cathedral, in a monk's cowl, between 
two Saxon saints to protect him. 
_ TTT Henry was crowned at the age of nine. 

Henry III., J ° 

1216-1272. England's motto during his long and 
feeble reign might well have been the words of 
Ecclesiastes, " Wo to thee, O land, when thy king 
is a child " ; for a child he remained to the last, and 
so the opposite of his father, whose heart was of 
millstone while Henry's was of wax. Dante has 
represented him in his " Purgatorio " as a man of 
simple life, spending his time singing psalms in a 
narrow valley. Still, one good thing which the 
world could ill afford to spare, was to come from 
the king's psalm-singing proclivity. Westminster 
abbey in its present form was almost wholly 



56 THE LEADING FACTS 

Henry's work. A monument so glorious goes far 
toward atoning for the absence of mental and moral 
grandeur in the builder. Yet, according to Dean 
Stanley, it was the expense incurred in erecting the 
great minster which was one of the chief causes 
of the illegal tax levies that bred discontent and 
finall} r civil war. 

In 1258, so strong was the pressure which bishop 
and barons alike brought to bear upon the king, 
that he was compelled to renew the agreement 
made by his father at Runnymede. Standing in 
St. Catherine's chapel, within the abbey not yet 
completed, Henry, holding a lighted taper in his 
hand, in company with the chief men of the realm, 
swore to observe the provisions of the covenant, 
exclaiming at the close, as he dashed the taper on 
the pavement, while all present repeated the words 
and the action, " So go out with smoke and stench 
the accursed souls of those who break or pervert 
this charter." There is no evidence that the king 
was insincere in his oath ; but unfortunately his 
piety was that of impulse not of principle. The com- 
pact was soon broken, and the land again stripped by 
imposts extorted by violence, partly to cover Henry's 
own extravagance, but largely to swell the coffers of 
the pope, who had promised to make his son ruler 
over Sicily. During this time the barons were 



OF ENGLISH HISTORY. 57 

daily growing more mutinous and defiant, prefer- 
ring, as they said, "to die rather than be ruined 
by the Romans." " I will send reapers and reap 
your fields for you," cried the king to Earl Bigod ; 
" And I will send you back the heads of your 
reapers," retorted the Earl. 

In 1264 the crisis was reached. Simon de Mont- 
fort, Earl of Leicester, better known to the people 
as Sir Simon the Righteous, with fifteen thousand 
Londoners and a number of the barons, met Henry, 
who had a stronger force, on the heights above the 
town of Lewes in Sussex. The result of the great 
battle fought there was as decisive as that which 
had been fought two centuries before, by the Con- 
queror, on the same coast. Bracton, the foremost 
jurist of that day, had said in his comments on the 
state of the times, " If the king were without a 
bridle, — that is the law, — they ought to put a bridle 
on him." Earl Simon had that bridle ready, and 
when victory made him " the head of the state," 
he called a parliament which differed from all its 
predecessors in the fact that, for the first time, two 
citizens from each city and two burgesses from each 
borough were summoned to join the barons and 
knights in their deliberations. In this way origi- 
nated that House of Commons which was to sit for 
more than three hundred years in the chapter-house 



58 THE LEADING FACTS 

of Henry's abbey at Westminster, and which was 
to make Magna Carta a living and effective truth 
instead of a dead promise to be rolled up, put away, 
and forgotten. Thus, says Macaulay, it was in 
Westminster in the thirteenth century — that age 
which saw the dawn of learning at Oxford and at 
Cambridge — that the archetype of every representa- 
tive assembly which now meets, either in the old 
world or the new, held its first sittings, — the be- 
ginning, as it proved, of what President Lincoln 
called, "government of the people, by the people, 
and for the people." 

Yet the same year brought for the earl a fata] 
reaction. The barons, jealous of his power, fell 
away from him. Edward, the king's eldest son, 
gathered them around the royal standard to attack 
and crush the man who had humiliated his father. 
De Montfort was at Evesham ; from the top of 
the church tower he saw the prince approaching. 
" Commend your souls to God," he said to the 
faithful few who stood by him; "for our bodies 
are the foes' ! " There he fell. In the north aisle 
of the abbey, not far from Henry's tomb, may be 
seen the emblazoned arms of the brave earl. Eng- 
land, so rich in effigies of her great men, so faithful, 
too, in her remembrance of them, has not yet set 
up in the vestibule of the Houses of Parliament, 



OF ENGLISH HISTORY. 59 

among the statues of her statesmen, the image of 
him who was in many respects the leader of them 
all, and the real originator and founder of the House 
itself. 

Edward I., ^ e ^ though Earl Simon was dead his work 

1272-1307. went on. Edward himself carried it for- 
ward and perfected it. In his reign the parliamentary 
system was developed and firmly established in its 
twofold form of Lords and Commons, and under the 
wise king's equitable rule the country prospered. 
Henry II. had labored to secure unity of law for all 
England, Edward had for his object the geographi- 
cal unity of the whole island. On the west, north 
Wales still maintained its independence. The king 
achieved its conquest, and the people accepted his 
infant son as Prince of Wales. The magnificent cas- 
tles of Caernarvon and of Conway were the two 
padlocks with which he secured the new territory. 
The North proved more difficult to overcome ; but the 
war ended in victoiy, and Edward seized at Scone 
the famous stone of destiny, on which the ancient 
kings of Scotland had been crowned, and, carrying 
the trophy to Westminster, enclosed it in the coro- 
nation-chair, which has been used by every sovereign 
from his son's reign to the present. Events proved, 
however, that Scotland was not wholly conquered. 
The patriot William Wallace rose and led his coun- 



60 THE LEADING FACTS 

trymen against the English — led them with that 
spirit of impetuous ardor which breathes in Burns's 
" Scots wha ha'e wi' Wallace bled." But fate was 
against him; the valiant soldier was captured, exe- 
cuted on Tower Hill as a traitor, and his head, 
crowned in mockery with a wreath of laurel, was set 
on a pike on London bridge. But though the hero, 
quartered on the scaffold, could not hinder his coun- 
try's becoming, one day, a part of England, — he 
did hinder its becoming so on unfair and tyrannous 
terms. " Scotland is not Ireland. No ; because 
brave men arose there and said, ' Behold, ye must not 
tread us down like slaves, — and ye shall not, — and 
ye cannot ! ' " 1 

The one dark stain on Edward's reign was his 
expulsion of the Jews, whom he first stripped of 
their possessions and then drove into exile, — a miser- 
able procession, in number no fewer than sixteen 
thousand. The brightest and tenderest side of his 
character showed itself in the crosses which he 
raised in mournful memory of his queen, Eleanor. 
These were erected at the places where her bod} T was 
set down in its transit from Lincoln, where she died, 
to the little village of Charing, 2 its last station before 
reaching its final resting place in the abbey, which 
holds such wealth of historic dust. At his death 

1 Carlyle, Past and Present. ' 2 Noto Charing Cross, London. 



OF ENGLISH HISTORY. 61 

Edward ordered his bones to be carried at the head 
of the army until Scotland should be conquered. 
Edward H. ^ " king " means the man who can, — the 

1307-1327. able man, — then Edward II. was no king ; 
he was simply a jester and a trifler. Neither moral 
nor intellectual earnestness was in him ; all he cared 
for were his ill-starred favorites, the Frenchman, Hugh 
Gaveston, and the English Despensers. Seeing his 
want of fibre, Scotland made a bold push to regain- 
its independence, and after a victory on the field of 
Bannockburn, Robert Bruce drove the English, like 
a flock of sheep, back over the border. 1 Disgusted 
with their leader, and jealous of those whom he 
delighted to honor, the barons united to depose 
Edward, and shut him up in Berkely Castle, in Glou- 
cestershire, where he was murdered. Over this 
stately structure, carefully preserved, is still displayed 
the standard borne in the Crusades by its gallant 
owner. 

Edward ill,, Froissart, secretary of Queen Philippa, 
1327-1377. w if e f Edward III., writes, in the courtly 
chronicle which is to his reign what the Bayeux Tap- 
estry is to that of William the Conqueror, u It is a com- 
mon opinion in England that between two valiant 
kings there is always one weak in mind and body ; 
and most true it is that this is apparent in the exam- 
1 See Scott's Tales of a Grandfather for narrative of Bruce. 



62 THE LEADING FACTS 

pie of the gallant King Edward, of whom I am now to 
speak. For his father, King Edward II., was weak, 
unwise, and cowardly, while his grandfather, the good 
King Edward, was wise, brave, very enterprising and 
fortunate in war." 1 

Edward the Third is directly connected with two 
most important events, the rise of English commerce, 
and the beginning of the Hundred Years' War. From 
a purely agricultural country England had begun, in 
its eastern counties, to give attention to wool-grow- 
ing, exporting the product to the Flemish cities of 
Ghent and Bruges to be woven into cloth, and 
returned to the English market: for, as Fuller 
quaintly remarks, the English people at that time 
knew no more what to do with the wool, than the 
sheep upon whose backs it grew. 

All this was now to be changed. By the introduc- 
tion of skilled Flemish workmen England took the 
first step in producing her own cloth, and, by doing 
so, laid the foundation of an industry which has since 
made her the greatest manufacturing powder in the 
world. In the early part of Edward's reign this 
undertaking was in its infancy, and the country 
still depended on the looms of Flanders. 

The king of France was desirous of getting pos- 
session of the Netherlands, and also of acquiring that 
1 Froissart, Chronicles. 



OF ENGLISH HISTOEY. 63 

tract of French territory south of the Loire, still 
held by England. To attain this object Philip har- 
assed the merchant ships of England with his priva- 
teers, while he formed an alliance with Scotland, and 
threatened to attack Edward's dominions from the 
north. 

Edward's rejoinder was an invasion of France, with 
an audacious demand for the surrender of the French 
crown, followed by the splendid victory of Crecy in 
1346, and, ten years later, that of Poictiers. At 
Crecy, small cannon were used for the first time, 
for the purpose of frightening the enemy's horses; 
they were laughed at as toys, but these toys were des- 
tined to revolutionize warfare in the course of the 
next century, and to make steel-clad knights simply 
a tradition and a name. 

No one, however, foresaw that event, and chivalry 
was apparently in its most brilliant period. The time 
had been when the monk and the nun were almost the 
exclusive ideals of Christian life ; but after the Cru- 
sades the profession of arms had been exalted, the 
rough and brutal warrior had learned that self- 
restraint and respect for others were higher quali- 
ties than prowess in the field. It is true that 
respect was due only to his own class ; yet who 
can doubt that to the cultivation of the sense of 
honor, truthfulness, and courtesy of those days, we 



64 THE LEADING FACTS 

are largely indebted now for the best type of the 
modern gentleman. Chivalry, therefore, was not 
lost, nor were they lost who established it. 

" The knights are dust, 
Their good swords rust, 
Their souls are with the saints, we trust." 

At Crecy, Edward's son, the Black Prince, a lad 
of fifteen, saw his first battle, and displayed that 
courage by which, ten years later, he was to win the 
field of Poictiers. Attacked by a much superior 
force, and hard-pressed, the Earl of Warwick became 
alarmed for the prince's safety and sent to the king 
for reinforcements. " Is my son killed ? " asked the 
king. " No, sire, please God." "Is he wounded?" 
"No, sire." "Is he thrown to the ground?" "No, 
sire; but he is in great danger." "Then," said the 
king, "I shall send no aid; let the boy win his 
spurs ; for I wish, if God so order it, that the honor 
of the victory shall be his." 

But better than any valor on the part of the nobles, 
was the sturdy right arm of the English yeomen 
which gained the day, with arrows, sent so thick, 
white, and fast, that Froissart compared them to a 
shower of snow. 

In the end, the Hundred Years' War left England 
with hardly a square mile of French soil, but the 



OF ENGLISH HISTORY. 65 

memory of the deeds done in those fierce contests 
made the glory of the Black Prince, whose dented 
breast-plate and helmet hang above his tomb at Can- 
terbury, one with the glory of the plain men whose 
names are found only in country churchyards ; so 
that whatever lingering feeling of jealousy and 
hatred had remained in England between the two 
races who occupied the soil, it gradually melted 
away in an honest patriotic pride that caused Nor- 
man and Saxon to confess that at last they were a 
united and homogeneous people. 

In 1349 a plague broke out in London, which 
swept over the whole country and destroyed more 
than half the population. In some cities, like 
Bristol, the living were hardly able to bury the dead. 
Labor was everywhere disorganized, "so that the 
world," as a chronicler of the times says, " was never 
able to return to its own estate." After the disease 
had spent itself, it was impossible to find men 
enough to till the fields and shear the sheep. The 
consequence of the scarcity of hands was a general 
demand for higher wages on the part of those who 
were free, and an effort by the serfs to break through 
the laws which held them bound to the soil. To 
check both these movements, Parliament passed the 
Statute of Laborers, making it a crime for them to 
demand higher wages than before the Black Death. 



66 THE LEADING FACTS 

But the agitation continued till it reached its climax 
under the next king. 

Richard n., Edward the Third's eldest son, the 
1377-1399. Black Prince, died a year before his 
father, and his son Richard (the Redeless, i.e., the 
unwise) obtained the crown. The most important 
event of this reign was the insurrection of Wat 
Tjder. The immediate cause of the uprising was 
the levying of an exorbitant poll-tax, rendered nec- 
essary by the expenses of the war with France. It 
was assessed on laborers of both sexes over fourteen 
years of age, and the collection in the case of Tyler's 
daughter, as in many others, was accompanied by a 
shameful insult; but the true grievance was much 
deeper, and the peasant revolt, which the poet 
Gower ridiculed, and which Froissart treated with 
courtly contempt, was the beginning of a momentous 
social revolution. 

Tyler gathered a multitude of discontented serfs 
and laborers on Blackheath common, to the number 
of sixty thousand. There, John Ball, a communist 
priest, preached to them from the lines, then familiar 
to every working-man, — 

" When Adam delved and Eve span, 
Who was then a gentleman ? " 

" Good people,'' cried the preacher, " things will 



OF ENGLISH HISTORY. 67 

never go well in England so long as goods be not in 
common, and so long as there be villains and gen- 
tlemen." It was in this preaching, as Green has said, 
that England first heard the declaration of the rights 
of man, and the knell of feudalism. 

According to tradition, the dagger emblazoned in 
the arms of the city of London shows how the up- 
rising was checked by the hand of the mayor of the 
city. Recent research resolves this dagger into the 
sword of St. Paul, and so gives the death stroke to 
another bit of ancient romance. 1 Be that as it may, 
the great movement continued to gather strength ; 
and though no violent demonstration was made after 
Tyler's death, until Cade's rebellion under Henry 
VI., yet serfdom was doomed, and in the course of 
the next century and a half villanage was gradually 
abolished, and the laborer acquired that greatest of 
all possessions, the ownership of himself. 

The new spirit was manifested likewise in litera- 
ture and in religion. Piers Plowman had dreamed 
his dream on the Malvern Hills, in which he had met 
" all the wealth of the world and its woe both." Con- 
trasting the wealth and the woe, he complained in 
his rugged verse how the latter predominates, and 
how the rich and great destroy the poor. Chaucer, 
on the other hand, painted the brighter side of life 

1 Loftie's History of London. 



68 THE LEADING FACTS 

in his "Canterbury Tales," but flouts with his wit the 
money-loving priest " with wallet full of pardons hot 
from Rome." 

Meanwhile John WyclifTe, who like Langland and 
Chaucer felt that the times were out of joint, sent 
forth his "poor priests," of whom Ball may have 
been one, to circulate his manuscript translation of 
the Bible. The cost of it was such that only the 
wealthy could own a complete copy, but those who 
could not spare money would give a load of hay for 
a few favorite chapters, though, at a later date, they 
were forced to hide these treasures under their 
house-floors, and to sit up at night or go secretly to 
the woods to read or hear the word of life. 

Forty years after Wycliffe's death, when the per- 
secution of his followers, known by the name of Lol- 
lards (i.e., Babblers or Psalm-singers), had begun, 
the reformer's body was condemned to be dug up 
and burned. According to tradition the ashes were 
thrown into a brook flowing into the Avon, and 
hence the lines : — 

" The Avon to the Severn runs, 
The Severn to the sea ; 
And Wycliffe's dust shall spread abroad, 
Wide as the waters be." 

Richard was hated by the nobles for his unjust ban- 



OF ENGLISH HISTORY. 69 

ishment of Henry of Bolingbroke, Duke of Hereford, 
and for his still more unjust confiscation of his 
estates. He was hated by the clergy for protecting 
the Lollards at court. He was hated by the people 
for new taxes which he levied. Hence his deposition 
in favor of Henry, who claimed not only his lands, 
but the throne. The king had rebuilt Westminster 
Hall. The first parliament that assembled there met 
to depose him. Shakespeare represents the scene in 
the great hall, and makes the king say, — 

" With mine own tears I wash away my balm, 
With mine own hand I give away my crown." 

After he was deposed he was imprisoned in Ponte- 
fract castle, where, like his grandfather Edward II., 
he was murdered. 



TO THE LEADING FACTS 



VII. 

" God's most dreaded instrument, 
In working out a pure intent, 
Is man — arrayed for mutual slaughter." 

Wordsworth. 

oojag^oo 

THE SELF-DESTRUCTION OF FEUDALISM. 

BARON AGAINST BARON. 

The Houses of Lancaster axd York, 1399-1485. 

Henry IV., 1399-1413. Edward V. 1483. 2 

Henry V., 1413-1422. Richard III., 1483-1485. 

Henry VI., 1422-1471. x House of Lancaster (the Red Rose). 

Edward IV., 1461-1483. House of York (the White Rose). 

Richard had no children. The near- 
Henry rv., 

1399-1413. est to the throne, by right of birth, was 
Roger Mortimer, a descendant of the Duke of York. 
But Parliament confirmed the claim of Henry, son 
of the Duke of Lancaster : hence the title, House 
of Lancaster. 

Such a beginning naturally led to a troubled 

reign. Owen Glendower of Wales joined the Percy 

party against Henry. The motives in both cases were 

personal rather than political, but the rebellion was 

1 Dethroned 1461. 2 Reigned two months. 



OF ENGLISH HISTORY. 71 

not the less formidable on that account. Henry 
Percy was Shakespeare's Hotspur of the North, — 
" he that kills me some six or seven dozen Scots 
at a breakfast, washes his hands, and says to his 
wife, ' Fie upon this quiet life.' ' At the battle of 
Shrewsbury (where FalstafT fought his long hour 
by Shrewsbury clock), the rebellion was finally 
crushed, though its seeds were destined to come up 
later, in another form,— in the Wars of the Roses. 

During this reign, the first law was passed send- 
ing heretics to the stake; and William Sautry, a 
London clergyman, the English proto-martyr, was 
burned for denying the doctrine of transubstantia- 
tion. Sautry's death was followed by a general 
persecution of the Lollards, partly for heresy and 
partly because they had identified themselves, in 
many cases, with the serfs in the attack on property. 
In Macaulay's judgment, had the Lollards of that 
day been successful and overthrown the Church of 
Rome, the vacant space would have been occupied 
by some system still more corrupt. 

Determined to unite the divided realm 

Henry v., 

1413-1422. left him by his unhappy father, Henry 
made war on France. With nine thousand men he 
met the enemy, sixty thousand strong, at Agincourt, 
To the wish of one of his nobles, that they had 
brought a larger force from England, he replied : — 



72 THE LEADING FACTS 

"... Xo, my fair cousin ; 
If we are marked to die, we are enough 
To do our country loss ; and if to live, 
The fewer men, the greater share of honor." 1 

Again the yeomen with their bows decided the day ; 
for France had no yeomen, and therefore no bow- 
men ; and so complete w T as the defeat that a treaty 
was signed declaring, on the part of Charles VI., 
that at his death his realm should be united to the 
English crown. 

Henr VI ^ ne ^ ie * r ^° a ^ ^°* S ^ 01 T was an infailt 

1421-1471, 2 son, crowned king of England and France 
at Paris, and acknowledged as Henry Sixth of Eng- 
land, and a few months later recrowned at St. Paul's, 
London. But the time had come when France, in 
the person of the brave peasant-maid, Joan of Arc, 
was to regain her own once more. The English, 
under the Duke of Bedford, Henry's uncle, had 
conquered town after town, until they had reached 
Orleans. If that fell, all would fall. But Joan, 
called, as she believed, by the Lord, and guided by 
heavenly voices, clad herself in white armor, and, 
inspiring her countrymen with her oavu courage, led 
them to victory. Later on she was basely deserted 
by her own people, captured by the English, and 
burned for witchcraft. But the noble work she had 
1 Shakespeare, Henry V. 2 Dethroned 1461, died 1471. 



OF ENGLISH HISTORY. 73 

begun did not die with her. The country was at 
last roused, and before the death of Henry VI., 
England had lost all possessions on the continent 
except a bare foot-hold at Calais. 

When Henry came of age, his reign was not cal- 
culated to bring peace to the country. He had had 
a guardian during his minority — he needed one all 
his days. Gardiner says of him that " he was some- 
times mad and sometimes sane, but unfortunate- 
ly was not much wiser when sane than when 
mad." 

In 1450 the insurrection of Jack Cade broke out. 
This rebellion was purely political, as Wat Tyler's, in 
1381, had been purely social. Cade's complaint, to use 
his own words, was " that the people of the shire are 
not allowed to have free election in the choosing of 
knights for the shire, but the tenants are forced to 
choose other people than the common will is." Cade, 
with a body of twenty thousand men, entered Lon- 
don, and, in Shakespeare's account, is represented as 
striking his staff on London Stone, — a Roman mon- 
ument, still standing, which marked the centre of the 
city, — and saying, " Now is Mortimer lord of this city, 
and here, sitting upon London Stone, I charge and 
command, that at the city's cost, this conduit run 
nothing but claret wine this first year of our reign ; 



74 THE LEADING FACTS 

and now it shall be treason for any man to call 
me other than Lord Mortimer." 1 

It is worthy of remark that here, as elsewhere in 
his historical plays, the great dramatist expresses no 
sympathy with the cause of the people. In his 
" King John " and " Richard II.," he passes over 
Magna Carta and Wat Tyler without a word; and 
he mentions Cade only to ridicule him and his move- 
ment. The explanation of this lies, perhaps, in the 
fact that Shakespeare lived in an age when England 
was threatened by both open and secret enemies. 
The need of the time was a strong, steady hand at 
the helm ; it was no season for reform or change 
of any sort. It may be for this reason he was silent 
in regard to democratic risings and popular demands 
in the past. 

With 1455 we enter on the long and dreary period 
of civil strife known as the Wars of the Roses. The 
English barons, having lost France, began to plunder 
one another ; and as the realm to which they were 
now confined was too small to be subdivided, a war 
of extermination ensued. In the beginning, the 
deposition of Richard I. furnished a plausible pretext 
for hostilities. One party fought, ostensibly, to re- 

1 Lord Mortimer, as representative of a branch of the House of 
York, laid claim to the crown. Cade usurped his name for effect. 

See Holinshed's Chronicles. 



IK 1 ^ 



OF ENGLISH HISTORY. 75 

instate that king's descendants, the other to keep 
Henry VI. and his descendants in power; one main- 
tained the rights of hereditary descent; the other, 
the right of parliament to make free choice. But 
beneath the surface the real contest was not for 
principle, but for place and spoils. Shakespeare 
makes the feud between the great Houses of Lan- 
caster and York break out into an angry quarrel in 
the Temple-garden in London, when Richard Plan- 
tagenet, Duke of York, says : — 

" Let him that is a true-born gentleman, 
And stands upon the honor of his birth, 
If he suppose that I have pleaded truth, 
From off this brier pluck a white rose with me." 

To which John Beaufort, Earl of Somerset, repre- 
sentative of the House of Lancaster, replies : — 

" Let him that is no coward, nor no flatterer, 
But dare maintain the party of the truth, 
Pluck a red rose from off this thorn with me," 

The Earl of Warwick rejoins : — 

" This brawl to-day, 
Grown to this faction in the Temple-gardens, 
Shall send, between the red rose and the white, 
A thousand souls to death and deadly night." 

The war, from the first battle of St. Albans to the 
last at Bosworth Field, continued through a period of 



76 THE LEADING FACTS 

thirty years. The battles as they went on grew 
more and more sanguinary. At last no quarter was 
asked or given. Eighty princes of the blood-royal 
perished, and more than half of all the nobility. Of 
those who escaped death b}' the sword, many died on 
the scaffold, while the remnant who were saved 
renewed their sufferings in foreign lands. Fenn, in 
his letters, says, " I, myself, saw the Duke of Exeter, 
the king of England's brother-in-law, walking bare- 
foot in the Duke of Burgundy's train, and begging 
his bread from door to door." Every individual of 
two generations of the families of Somerset and 
Warwick fell on the field or on the scaffold. In 
tracing family pedigrees one is surprised how often 
the record reads, "killed at St. Albans," "slain at 
Towton," " beheaded after the battle of Wakefield," 
and the like. When the terrible contest was closed, 
the old feudal order was gone ; and as in most cases 
their estates either fell to the crown for lack of heirs, 
or were fraudulently seized by the king's officers, it 
followed that a large part of the wealthiest and most 
powerful nobility in the world disappeared so com- 
pletely that from that time they ceased to have a 
local habitation or a name. 
Edward iv. At the battle of Wakefield, in 1460, the 



(House of 
York), 

1461-1483, Duke of York's head, with a paper crown, 



Lancastrian party gained the day, and the 



OF ENGLISH HISTORY. 77 

was fastened in mockery over the gate of York. 
But the next year the king's party was defeated 
with great slaughter, at Towton, and the Earl of 
Warwick, thenceforth popularly known as "the 
king-maker," placed Edward, the eldest son of the 
Duke of York, on the throne; while Henry, taken 
prisoner, was hurried off to the Tower. During the 
whole of Edward's reign, the war went on with 
varying success, but with unvarying ferocity. 

The Earl who had raised Edward up, ten years 
later thrust him down, and restored Henry VI. ; 
but at the battle of Barnet, Warwick was slain, 
and Edward obtained the throne again, while Henry, 
led back to the Tower, died " one of those conven- 
iently sudden deaths " which were then so common. 

But an event was at hand of greater importance 
than any question of crowns or parties, though its 
full significance was not recognized at the time. 
William Caxton, a London merchant, having, while 
in Holland, learned the new art of printing, returned 
to England, and set up a small press in the almonry of 
Westminster abbey, where "at the sign of the red 
pole " he advertised his wares, " good chepe." There 
he published the first book that issued from the press in 
England, " the dictes or sayengis of the philosophres, 
enprynted by me, William Caxton, at Westmestre, 
the yere of our lorde, M.CCCC.LXVII." Re- 



78 THE LEADING FACTS 

cently a memorial window has been placed in St. 
Margaret's church, within the abbey-grounds, as a 
tribute to the man, who, while the country was red 
with carnage and filled with destruction, introduced 
the "art preservative of all arts." 
Edward V., At his death, Edward IV. left a son 

1483-1483. Edward. The lad was placed under the 
guardianship of his uncle, Duke of Gloucester, who 
was named Protector to rule in his nephew's stead, 
until he became of age. The young prince and his 
brother, the Duke of York, were murdered in the 
Tower by his command, in order that he might take 
the throne. 

Richard in. -^ r - Gardner, in his life of King Rich- 
1483-1485- ard, says that he began gathering material 
for the work, in the belief that Richard had been 
misrepresented ; but that after several years, spent in 
patient research, he is obliged to confess that re- 
deeming traits do not appear. We must then 
believe that the last of the kings of the house of 
York was indeed the repulsive personage which 
tradition represents — distorted in figure, of for- 
bidding aspect, and with ambition so unrestrained 
that the words which Shakespeare attributes to him 
may have been really his : — 

" Then since the heavens have shaped my body so, 
Let hell make crookt my mind to answer it." 



OF ENGLISH HISTORY. 79 

Personally he was brave. He promoted some use- 
ful reforms, and lie encouraged Caxton in his great 
work ; but fortunately his reign was short. Henry 
Tudor, Earl of Richmond, a descendant, through 
his mother, of the house of Lancaster, was in Brit- 
tany awaiting his opportunity to invade England 
and claim the crown. In 1485, he landed with 
a small force at Milford Haven, south Wales, 
where he was sure of welcome, because his paternal 
ancestry were Welsh. Advancing through Shrews- 
bury, he met Richard on Bosworth Field in Leices- 
tershire. The treachery of some of Richard's 
adherents decided the day. " Uttering a cry of 
' treason ! treason ! ' as he saw himself deserted, 
Richard dashed into the fight. With the fury of 
despair, he flung the Lancastrian standard to the 
ground, and had hewed his way into the very 
presence of Ins rival, when he fell, overpowered 
by numbers; and the crown which he had worn, 
which after the struggle was found lying near 
a hawthorn bush, was placed on the head of the 
conqueror." 



80 THE LEADING FACTS 



VIII. 

" One half her soil has walked the rest 
In heroes, martyrs, poets, sages." 



O. W. Holmes. 

-00>®<0-0 



POLITICAL REACTION. — ABSOLUTISM OF THE CROWN. 
— THE ENGLISH REFORMATION AND THE ENGLISH 
RENAISSANCE. 

CROWN OR POPE? 

House of Tudor, 1485-1603. 

Henry vn., Before leaving France, Henry had 
1485-1509. promised to marry Elizabeth, eldest daugh- 
ter of Edward IV., thus uniting the rival Houses of 
York and Lancaster, and by this means putting an 
end to the civil war. The marriage was duly cele- 
brated, and in the beautiful window of stained glass 
in Henry Seventh's Chapel in Westminster abbey, 
the roses are seen joined, and as is quaintly said in 
the old rhyme : — 

" Both roses flourish — red and white — 
In love and sisterly delight ; 
The two that were at strife are blended, 
And all old troubles now are ended." 

With the union, peace indeed came. The chief 
nobles were, with few exceptions, dead ; their estates 



OF ENGLISH HISTORY. 81 

confiscated; their retainers scattered. The small 
number that remained were no longer to be feared. 
The introduction of cannon had changed the art of 
war. " Throughout the middle ages, the call of a 
great baron had been enough to raise a formidable 
revolt. Yeomen and retainers took down the bow 
from their chimney corner, knights buckled on their 
armor ; and in a few days an army threatened the 
throne. But without artillery such an army was 
now helpless ; and the one train of artillery in the 
kingdom lay at the disposal of the king." 1 

Henry's reign was in the interest of the middle 
classes. He gave them the protection they had so 
long wanted. In order to raise money without resort 
to taxation, he extorted large sums from the rich, by 
a device of his chief minister, Cardinal Morton, and 
which was known and dreaded as " Morton's Fork." 
If a person lived handsomely, the cardinal would 
insist on a correspondingly liberal gift; if, on the 
other hand, a citizen lived very plainly, he insisted 
none the less, since he argued that, by his economy, 
he must have accumulated means to bestow the 
" benevolence," as the extortion was, somewhat ironi- 
cally, termed. Thus, on the one prong or the other 
of his "fork," the shrewd cardinal impaled his 
writhing victims, and speedily filled the royal 

treasury. 

1 Macaulay. 



82 THE LEADING FACTS 

Another method of raising money, while it also 
rendered the king more secure, was a revival of the 
statute of Liveries, which imposed a heavy fine on 
noblemen who clothed their followers in military 
garb, or designated them with a badge of military 
service. Said the king to the Earl of Oxford, as he 
left the earl's castle where a large number of liveried 
servants Avere drawn up to do him honor, " Aly lord, 
I thank you for yo ur entertainment, but my attor- 
ney must speak to } r ou." The attorney, who was 
the notorious Empson, brought suit against the earl, 
and he was fined ten thousand pounds for violation 
of the law, 

During Henry's reign two pretenders laid claim 
to the crown, — Lambert Symnel, who represented 
himself to be Edward Plantagenet, son to the Duke 
of Clarence ; and Perkin Warbeck, who asserted that 
he was Richard, Duke of York. Symnel commuted 
his claim for the position of scullion in the king's 
kitchen, while Warbeck, who showed himself of less 
tractable disposition, was hanged. 

Emerson remarks that when the visitor to West- 
minster abbey mounts the steps at the eastern end 
leading to Henry Seventh's Chapel, he passes from 
the mediaeval to the beginning of the modern period. 
The true significance of Henry's reign is that it dis- 
tinctly marks that change. It is the threshold of 



OF ENGLISH HISTORY. 88 

a new epoch; — new in modes of government, in law, 
in discovery, in letters, art and religion. The cen- 
tury just closing was one of the most remarkable in 
history. Not indeed in what it had actually accom- 
plished, but for the seed it had sown for the future. 
The artist Kaulbach, in his fresco " The Age of the 
Reformation," has summed up all that it was and all 
that it was to become in its full development. 
Therein, we see it as the century which witnessed 
the sailing of Columbus and of Cabot ; the introduc- 
tion of hre-arms, and the consequent overthrow of 
feudal warfare and feudal institutions ; the revival of 
classic learning ; the issue of the first printed book ; 
and the birth of that German monk who was to 
emancipate the human mind from its long bondage 
to unmeaning tradition and to arbitrary authority. 
Henry VIII., Henry was just eighteen years of age 
1509-1547. when he came to the throne. The country 
was at peace, was highly prosperous, and the young 
king had everything in his favor. He was handsome, 
well-educated, and fond of athletic sports. His frank 
disposition won friends, and he had inherited from 
his father the largest private fortune that had ever 
descended to an English sovereign. Intellectually, 
he was in hearty sympathy with the revival of learn- 
ing, which was then beginning both on the conti- 
nent and in England. He showed himself a firm 



84 THE LEADING FACTS 

friend to Dean Colet in his educational reforms, 
saying, " Let others have what doctors they like ; 
this is the doctor for me." 

He encouraged Erasmus in his great work of trans- 
lating the Greek Testament. He founded Trinity 
College, Cambridge ; and he confirmed Wolsey's 
endowments at Oxford. Yet he continued to be a 
staunch Romanist ; and his reply to Luther so 
delighted the pope, that he conferred on him the 
title of " Defender of the Faith " ; and sent to him 
the two-handed sword, destined to be the symbol 
of the king's final separation from the power that 
gave it. 

Politically, Henry was equally fortunate. The 
victory of Flodden had placed Scotland at his feet. 
The king of France and the Emperor Charles V. 
vied with each other in seeking his alliance, for 
Henry held the balance of power between them, and 
it was owing to his policy that England advanced 
from a third-rate power to one fully abreast of the 
foremost nations of Europe. 

In less than twenty years the king had become 
another man. At the age of twelve he had married, 
at his father's command, and solely for political 
and mercenary reasons, Katharine of Aragon, his 
brother Arthur's widow, who was six years his 
senior. Such a marriage was forbidden, both by 



OF ENGLISH HISTORY. 85 

the Mosaic law and by the ordinances of the Church; 
but the pope had sanctioned it, and when Henry 
ascended the throne the ceremony was performed 
a second time. Several children were the fruit of 
this union; but all died in infancy, except one 
daughter, — Mary, unhappily fated to figure as the 
" bloody Mary " of later history. 

No woman had yet ruled in her own right, either 
in England or in Europe, and so anxious was Henry 
to have a son to succeed him, that he had, several 
years before, sent the Duke of Buckingham to the 
block for casually saying that if the king died with- 
out issue, he should consider himself entitled to 
receive the crown. 

It was while meditating this question of the suc- 
cession, that Henry met Anne Boleyn, . one of the 
queen's maids of honor, a sprightly brunette of 
nineteen, with long black hair and beautiful eyes. 
The light that shone in those eyes, though hardly 
that " gospel light " which the poet calls it, cleared 
up all difficulties in the royal mind. The king now 
felt conscientiously moved to obtain a divorce from 
the old wife and to marry a new one. In that deter- 
mination lay most momentous consequences, for it 
forever separated England from the jurisdiction of 
the Church of Rome. 

Cardinal Wolsey lent his powerful aid to bring 



86 THE LEADING FACTS 

about the divorce, but with the expectation that 
Hemy would many a princess of France, and thus 
for in an alliance with that country. AVhen he 
learned that the king's choice was Anne Boleyn, he 
fell on his knees, and begged him not to persist in 
his design ; but his entreaties had no effect, and 
the cardinal was obliged to continue what he had 
begun. 

Application had been made to the pope to annul 
the marriage with Katharine, on the ground of ille- 
gality ; but the pope was in the power of Charles 
V., who was the queen's nephew. Hence vexatious 
delays became the rule of the day. At last, a court, 
composed of Wolsey and Campeggio, as papal 
legates, was convened at Blackfriars, London, to 
test the validity of the marriage. Henry and 
Katharine were summoned. The king appeared 
and answered to his name ; but Katharine, when 
called, declined to answer, and, throwing herself 
at Henry's feet, begged him, with tears and sobs, 
not to put her away without a cause. Finding him 
inflexible, she left the hall, and refused to attend 
again, appealing to Rome for justice. 

This was in the spring of 1529. Nothing was 
done that summer, and in the autumn the court, 
instead of reaching a decision, dissolved. Cam- 
peggio, the Italian legate, returned; and Henry, 



OF ENGLISH HISTORY. 87 

to his disappointment and rage, received an order 
to carry the question to the pope for settlement. 

Both the king and Anne believed that Wolsey 
had played false with them, and they resolved upon 
his fall. The cardinal had a presentiment of his 
impending doom. The French ambassador, who 
saw him at this juncture, said that his face had 
shrunk to half its size. But his fortunes were to 
shrink even more than his face. To save himself, 
Wolsey gave up everything ; — his pomp, power and 
wealth vanished in a moment. Well might he say 
of Anne : 

" There was the weight that pulled me down. 
, . . All my glories, in that one woman I have lost 
forever." l 

Thus stripped, he was permitted to go into retire- 
ment in the North ; but a twelvemonth later he was 
arrested on a charge of treason. On the way to 
London he fell mortally ill, and turned aside at 
Leicester to die in the abbey there. 

« . . . O, Father Abbot, 
An old man, broken with the storms of state, 
Is come to lay his weary bones among ye: 
Give him a little earth for charity ! " 2 

After Wolsey's death, Dr. Thomas Cranmer, of 
Cambridge, suggested that the king lay the divorce 

i Shakespeare, Henry VIII. 2 Ibid. 



88 THE LEADING FACTS 

question before the universities of Europe. Henry 
caught eagerly at this proposition, and exclaimed, 
" Cranmer has the right sow by the ear/' The 
scheme was at once adopted. Several universities 
returned favorable answers ; in a few instances, as at 
Oxford and Cambridge, where there was hesitation, 
a judicious use of bribes or threats brought them 
to see the matter in a proper light. 

Armed with these decisions in his favor, Henry 
now charged the whole body of the English clergy 
with being guilty of the same crime of which 
Wolsey had been accused. 1 In their terror, they 
made haste to buy a pardon, at a cost reckoned at 
nearly a million of pounds at the present value of 
money; and, furthermore, declared Henry to be 
the supreme head on earth of the Church of Eng- 
land, adroitly adding, " in so far as is permitted by 
the law of Christ." Thus, as Taine wittily observes, 
the Reformation came into England by a side-door. 
Nevertheless it came. 

Events now moved rapidly to a crisis. Thomas 
Cromwell, Wolsey's former servant and fast friend, 
succeeded him in the king's favor, and became vicar- 
general. In 1533, after having waited over five 
years, Henry privately married Anne, and she was, 
soon after, crowned in Westminster abbey. When 
the pope was informed of this, he ordered the 

1 i.e., " Praemunire," see Section XII. 18. 



OF ENGLISH HISTORY. 89 

king to put her away, and take back Katharine. 
Parliament met the demand by passing the act of 
supremacy, which declared, without reservation, 
Henry to be the sole head of the Church, and 
making denial thereof treason. As he signed the 
act, the king, with one stroke of his pen, overturned 
the tradition of a thousand years ; and England 
stood boldly forth independent of the pope. 

But, as Luther said, Henry had a pope inside him. 
With Cromwell's aid he proceeded to prove it. Now 
that the Wars of the Roses had destroyed the power 
of the barons, there was no check on the despotic 
will of the king. Parliament was but the echo of 
the throne. It had already empowered the king to 
annul all legislative acts passed before he was of age, 
and to choose his successor to the throne. It now 
enacted that law which was in itself the destruction 
of all law, by which the king, by his simple procla- 
mation could declare any opinions heretical and 
punishable with death. Cromwell, in his machiave- 
lian policy, "had reduced bloodshed to a science." 
He first introduced the practice of condemning an 
accused person without hearing his defence. No one 
was now safe who did not openly side with the king. 
More and Fisher were executed because they could 
not affirm that they conscientiously believed that 
Henry was morally and spiritually entitled to be the 
head of the English Church. 



90 THE LEADING FACTS 

When the intelligence of the judicial murder of 
the venerable ex-chancellor reached Rome, the pope 
issued a bull of excommunication and deposition 
against Henry, delivering his soul to the devil and 
his kingdom to the first invader. The king retorted 
by suppressing the monasteries, which, in most cases, 
had sunk into the lowest state of ignorance, drunk- 
enness and profligacy. 

Their vices, however, the king had already made 
his own. It was their wealth which he now coveted. 
The smaller religious houses were speedily swept out 
of existence, but Parliament hesitated at abolishing 1 
the greater ones. Henry, it is reported, sent for a 
leading member of the commons, and, laying his 
hand on the head of the kneeling representative, said, 
" Get my bill passed by to-morrow, little man, or else 
to-morrow this head of yours will be off." The next 
day the bill passed, and the work of destruction was 
completed, — a work which involved the confiscation 
of millions of property, and the summary execution 
of abbots who, like those of Glastonbury and Charter- 
house, dared to resist. 

The great estates, thus suddenly acquired by the 
crown, were granted to court favorites, or thrown 
away at the gambling-table. It is from this date, 
says Hallam, that the leading families of England, 
both within and without the peerage, become con- 



OF ENGLISH HISTORY. 91 

spicuous through having obtained possession of the 
monastery lands, estimated to comprise one-fifth of 
the whole area of the kingdom. 

The abolition of so many religious institutions 
necessarily caused great misery to those who were 
turned out upon the world, destitute of means and 
without ability to work. To this should be added 
the fact that for a long period an industrial revolu- 
tion had been in progress, which was productive of 
wide-spread suffering. 

Farmers, having discovered that wool-growing was 
more profitable than grain-raising, had turned their 
fields into sheep-pastures ; so that a shepherd, with 
his dog, now took the place of several families of 
laborers ; thereby, multitudes of poor people were 
reduced to the verge of starvation, and as the mon- 
asteries no longer existed to hold out a helping hand 
to the needy, the whole realm was so overrun with 
beggars and thieves, that Latimer declared that, if 
every farmer should raise two acres of hemp, it would 
not make rope enough to bang them all. Henry, 
however, set to work with characteristic vigor, and, it 
is said, made way with upwards of seventy-two thou- 
sand during his reign, but without abating the evil. 

In 1536, less than three years after her coronation, 
the new queen, for whom Henry had "turned Eng- 
land and Europe upside down/' was accused of un- 



92 THE LEADING FACTS 

faithfulness. She was sent, a prisoner, to the tower, 
and, a short time after, her head rolled in the dust — 
its beauty gone out forever. The next morning 
Henry married Jane Seymour, Anne's maid of honor. 
A year later she died, leaving a son, — Edward. She 
was no sooner gone than the king began looking 
about for some one to take her place. This time 
Cromwell had projects of his own, for a German 
Protestant alliance, and succeeded in persuading bis 
master to agree to marry Ann of Cleves, whom he 
had never seen, but whom the painter, Holbein, had 
represented as of marvellous beauty. 

When Ann reached England, Henry hurried to 
meet her, but found, to his dismay, that not only was 
she ridiculously ugly, but that she could speak noth- 
ing but Dutch, of which he did not understand a word. 
His disgust must be imagined — not described. Mat- 
ters, however, had gone too far to retract, and the 
marriage was consummated. The king obtained a 
divorce within six months, and then took his revenge 
by cutting off Cromwell's head. 

The same year, 1540, Henry married Catherine 
Howard. Not long after, she was accused of the 
fault for which Anne Bole}m had suffered, and met 
with like fate. Not to be baffled in his matrimonial 
experiments, the king, in 1543, took Catherine Parr 
for his sixth, and, as it proved, his last, wife. 



OF ENGLISH HISTORY. 93 

She, too, would have gone to the block, on a charge 
of heresy, had not her quick wit saved her by a 
happily turned compliment which flattered the king's 
theological acumen. 

Though occupied with these rather numerous 
domestic infelicities, Henry was not idle in other 
directions. By a bill known as the Six Articles, 1 or, 
as the Protestants called it, the Bloody Act, the king 
had established a new form of religion which w*as 
simply papacy with the pope left out. Geograph- 
ically, the country was perhaps about equally divided 
between Romanism and Protestantism. The north- 
ern and western half clung to the ancient faith ; the 
southern and eastern, including most of the large 
cities, was favorable to the reformation. Henry did 
not throw his influence on either side, but made con- 
cessions to both. On the one hand, he prohibited the 
Lutheran doctrines ; on the other, he caused the Bible 
to be translated, and ordered a copy to be placed in 
every parish-church in England. Men found them- 
selves in a strange and cruel dilemma. If it was 
dangerous to believe too much, it was not less dan- 
gerous to believe too little. Traitor and heretic 
were dragged to execution on the same hurdle — the 
one a Catholic who denied the king's supremacy; the 
other, a Protestant who refused to believe in transub- 
stantiation. 

1 See Section XII. 23. 



D4 THE LEADING FACTS 

But the time was at hand when Henry was to 
cease his hangings, beheadings, and marriages. 
Worn out with debauchery, he died at the age of 
fifty-six, a loathsome and helpless mass of corruption. 
Raleigh said of him, "If all the pictures and patterns 
of a merciless prince were lost in the world, they 
might all again be painted to the life out of the story 
of this king." It may be well to remember this, and 
wfth it this other saying of the ablest living writer on 
English constitutional history, that "the world owes 
some of its greatest debts to men from whose mem- 
ory it recoils." The "obligation it is under to Henry 
Eighth, is, that through his influence — no matter 
what the motive — England was lilted up out of the 
old rut of Romanism, and placed squarely and securely 
on the highway of national progress. 
Edward VI Edward, son of Henry by Jane Seymour, 

1547-1553, died at sixteen. During liis nominal reign 
of six years, the government, says Professor Gardiner, 
was managed by a handful of religious theorists, 
and a band of greedy and profligate courtiers, who 
seized the unenclosed land and fenced it in for sheep 
pastures, thus depriving thousands of the means of 
subsistence 

Edward was a zealous Protestant, and, at his 
desire. Archbishop Cranmer compiled the Book of 
Common Prayer. The articles of faith of the 



OF ENGLISH HISTORY. 95 

Church of England were also drawn up at this 
time. The confiscation of Roman Catholic church 
property 1 was continued, and a part of the money 
thus obtained was eventually devoted to the endow- 
ment of grammar schools and hospitals in different 
parts of the country. On his death-bed Edward 
established Christ Church School, and St. Thomas 
Hospital, London. "So he was the founder," says 
Burnet, " of those houses which, by many great addi- 
tions since that time, have risen to be amongst the 
noblest in Europe." Christ Church was the first, or 
one of the first Protestant charity schools opened in 
England, and it is generally known as the Blue-Coat 
school, from the costume of the boys — a relic of the 
days of Edward. This consists of a long blue coat, like 
a monk's gown, reaching to the ankles, girded with a 
broad leathern belt, long, bright-yellow stockings 
and buckled shoes. As a rule, the boys go bare- 
headed, winter and summer. An exciting game of 
foot-ball, played in the school-yard in this peculiar, 
mediaeval dress, seems a startling anachronism, and 
is a sight long to be remembered. Coleridge, Lamb, 
and other noted men were educated here, and have 
left most interesting reminiscences of their school 
life. 2 

1 i.e., chantries and churches were now seized. 

2 See Lamb's Essays on Christ-Church Hospital. 



i)(j THE LEADING FACTS 

Speaking of the Reformation, of which Edward 
VI. may be taken as a representative, Macaulay 
remarks that it is difficult to say whether England 
has received most advantage from the Roman Cath- 
olic religion or from the Reformation. For the 
amalgamation of races, and the abolition of villan- 
age, she is chiefly indebted to the influences which 
the priesthood in the middle ages exercised over 
the laity. For political and intellectual freedom, 
and for all the blessings which these have brought 
in their train, she is chiefly indebted to the great 
rebellion of the laity against the priesthood. 
Maryj Mary, daughter of Henry VIII. and 

1553-1558. Katharine of Aragon. On the death of Ed- 
ward, Lady Jane Grey was persuaded against her 
judgment to assume the crown left to her by the 
will of the late king, who earnestly desired to have a 
Protestant successor, although Mary, who was an 
avowed Romanist, was the rightful heir. Mary, 
however, received the support of the country ; and 
Lady Jane and her husband, Lord Dudley, were 
sent to the Tower, and from the Tower to the 
scaffold. The name Jane, cut in the stone wall of 
the Beauchamp tower, remains as a memorial of 
k> the ten days' queen," who died at the age of 
seventeen, an innocent victim of the greatness 
which had been thrust upon her. 



OF ENGLISH HISTORY. 97 

In the year following her accession, Mary married 
Philip II. of Spain, a gloomy and selfish fanatic, who 
cared for nothing but the spread of Romanism. He 
soon found that the air of England had too much 
freedom in it to suit his constitution, and he re- 
turned to the more congenial climate of Spain. 
From that time, Mary, who was left to rule alone, 
directed all her effort toward the restoration of the 
Catholic Church. The legislation of Henry VIII. 's 
and of Edward's reign, so far as it gave support to 
Protestantism, was repealed, and the old relations 
with Rome were resumed. To accomplish her ob- 
ject, the queen resorted to the arguments of the 
dungeon, the rack and the fagot. In that age, relig- 
ious toleration was unknown. Mary would, doubt- 
less, have bravely endured for her faith the full 
measure of suffering which she inflicted. Her state 
of mind was that of all who hold strong convictions. 
Each faction believed it a duty to convert or exter- 
minate the other ; and the alternative offered to a 
heretic was to " turn or burn." 

Cranmer, who perished at Oxford, had been 
zealous in sending to the flames those who differed 
from him. Sir Thomas More, who gave his life as 
a sacrifice to conscience, was eager to put Tyndale 
to the torture, for translating the Bible. Latimer, 
who died bravely exhorting his companion, Ridley, 



98 THE LEADING FACTS 

to " be of good cheer, and play the man, since " as 
he declared, " they would light such a candle in 
England that day, as in God's grace should not be 
put out," had himself abetted the kindling of slow 
fires under men as honest and as determined as he 
was, but on the opposite side. In like spirit, Mary 
kept Smithfielcl ablaze with martyrs, whose blood 
was the seed of Protestantism. 

But Mary's career was brief. She died in 1558, 
shortly after the close of an inglorious war with 
France, which ended in the fall of Calais, the last 
English possession on the soil of France. It was a 
great blow to her pride and a humiliation to the 
country. " After my death," she said, " you will find 
Calais written on my heart ; " could she have fore- 
seen the future, her grief would have been greater 
still, for with the close of her reign, the pope lost all 
power in England, never to regain it. 

Mary's name has come to us coupled with an 
epithet expressive of the utmost abhorrence. But 
she deserves pity rather than hatred. Her cruelty 
was the cruelty of sincerity, never, as was her 
father's, the result of indifference or caprice. A 
little book of prayers, left by her, soiled by constant 
use, and stained with many tears, tells the story of 
her broken, disappointed life. Sickly, ill-favored, 
childless, unloved, the poor woman spent herself for 



Or ENGLISH HISTORY. 99 

naught. Her first great mistake was that she reso- 
lutely turned her face toward the past; her second, 
that she loved Philip of Spain with all her heart, 
soul, and strength, and so, out of devotion to a bigot, 
she did a bigot's work, and earned the execration 
which is a bigot's reward. 

Elizabeth, Elizabeth, daughter of Henry VIII. and 

1558-1603, Anne Boleyn. When the news of Mary's 
death was brought to Elizabeth, at Hatfield house, she 
was greatly moved, and exclaimed, " It is the Lord's 
doing, it is marvellous in our eyes." Her policy 
from the beginning was one of compromise. In 
order to conciliate the Catholic party, she retained 
eleven of her sister's counsellors, and added to 
them Sir Nicholas Bacon, Cecil, with others who were 
favorable to the reformed faith. 

Mary, beside having repealed the legislation of the 
two preceding reigns, in so far as it was opposed to 
her own religious convictions, also had suppressed Ed- 
ward's liturgy and restored the Latin Mass-book. 
At Elizabeth's coronation a petition was presented, 
stating that it was the custom to release a certain 
number of prisoners on such occasions; therefore, 
her majesty was begged to set at liberty the four 
evangelists, Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John, and 
also the apostle Paul, who had been for some time 
shut up in a strange language. The English ser- 



100 THE LEADING FACTS 

vice-book, with some slight changes, was accordingly 
re-instated, and the Act of Uniformity, 1 enacted soon 
after, required English clergymen, under penalty of 
imprisonment for life, to use it, and it only ; while the 
same act imposed a fine on all persons who failed to at- 
tend the Church of England on Sundays and holidays. 

No sooner was the queen's accession announced to 
the pope, than he declared her illegitimate, and 
ordered her to lay aside the crown and submit 
entirely to his guidance. Such a demand was a 
signal for battle, and however much attached a large 
part of the nation, especially of the country people, 
may have been to the religion of their fathers, the 
temper of Parliament manifested itself in the imme- 
diate passage of the Act of Supremacy, 2 which was 
essentially the same, " though with its edge slightly 
blunted," which, under Henry, had freed England 
from the dominion of the court of Rome. 

To this act every member of the Commons was 
obliged to subscribe, thus excluding all Catholics, 
but the Lords, not being an elective body, were 
excused from the obligation. A few years later the 
creed of the English Church, which had been first 
formulated under Edward VI., was revised and 
reduced to the Thirty-Nine Articles which constitute 
it at the present time. 

But the real value of the religious revolution 

l See Section XII. 28. 2 $ ee Section XII. 27. 



OF ENGLLSH HISTORY. 101 

which was taking place did not lie in the substitu- 
tion of one creed for another, but in the new spirit 
of inquiry and the new freedom of thought and dis- 
cussion awakened by the change. 1 

As for Elizabeth herself, she apparently had no 
deep and abiding convictions on these matters. Her 
tendency was toward Protestantism, but to the end 
of her life she remained Catholic in her nerves ; a 
crucifix with lighted candles in front of it hung in 
her private chapel, before which the queen prayed 
to the Virgin as fervently as her sister Mary had 
ever done. 

In this double course she represented the nation, 
which hesitated about committing itself fully to 
either side. Men were not wanting who were ready 
to lay down their lives for conscience' sake ; but 
they were in the minority. Many sympathized at 
heart with the notorious Vicar of Bray, who kept his 
living under the successive reigns of Henry, Edward, 
Mary, and Elizabeth, changing his theology with 
each change of rulers, and who, when stigmatized as 
a turncoat, replied, " Not so ; for I have always 
been true to my principles, which are to live and die 
the Vicar of Bray.*' 2 

1 See Green's English People. 

2 "For this as law I will maintain 

Until my dying day, sir, 
That whatsoever king shall reign, 
I'll be Vicar of Bray, sir." 



102 THE LEADING FACTS 

Though there was nothing morally noble in such 
"halting between two opinions," yet it doubtless 
saved England, for the time being, from that worst 
of all calamities, a religious civil war, such as rent 
France in pieces and drenched her fair fields with 
the blood of Catholics and Huguenots; split Ger- 
many and Italy into petty states; and ended, in 
Spain, in the triumph of the Inquisition, and intel- 
lectual death. 1 

Elizabeth showed the same consummate tact with 
regard to marriage as respecting worship. Her first 
parliament begged her to consider the question of 
taking a husband. Her reply was that she had 
resolved to live and die a maiden queen. Still 
pressed, she returned answers that, like the ancient 
oracles, could be interpreted either way. Philip of 
Spain, who had married her sister Mary, made over- 
tures to her, and she kept him waiting in uncertainty 
until at last his embassador lost all patience, and 
declared that she had ten thousand devils in her. 
The Duke of Alengon proposed, and was so favorably 
received, that the country became alarmed at the 
prospect of having a Catholic king, and Stubbs, a 
Puritan lawyer, published a coarse and violent pam- 
phlet against it. For this attack his right hand was cut 
off, and as it fell, he seized his hat with the remain- 

1 Gardiner, English History. 



OF ENGLISH HISTORY. 103 

ing hand and waved it, shouting, " God save Queen 
Elizabeth." That action was an index to the pop- 
ular feeling. Men stood by the crown even when 
they condemned its policy, determined at all hazards 
to preserve the unity of the nation. 

During all this time the court buzzed with whis- 
pered scandals. Elizabeth was a confirmed coquette. 
Dudley and Essex and Raleigh were by turns her 
favorites, and over her relations with the first there 
hangs the terrible shadow of the murder of Ins wife, 1 
the beautiful Amy Robsart. Her vanity was as in- 
satiable as it was ludicrous. She issued a proclama- 
tion forbidding any one to make or sell her picture, 
lest it should fail to do her justice. She was greedy 
of flattery, even when long past sixty ; and there was 
a sting of truth in the letter of Mary, queen of Scots, 
to her saying, " Your aversion to marriage proceeds 
from your not wishing to lose the liberty of compel- 
ling people to make love to you." 

She lived in an atmosphere of splendor, of pleasure 
and of adulation. Her reign was full of pageants, 
progresses and feasts like those which Scott describes 
in his delightful novel, "Kenil worth." In temper 
Elizabeth was arbitrary, fickle and passionate. When 
her blood was up she would swear like a trooper, 
spit on a courtier's new velvet doublet, beat her 

1 See the De Quadra letter in Froude. 



104 THE LEADING FACTS 

maids of honor, or box Essex's ears. She wrote 
abusive and profane letters to high church digni- 
taries, and openly insulted the wife of Archbishop 
Parker, because she did not believe in a married 
clergy. In her diplomatic relations she never hesi- 
tated at a lie if it would serve her purpose ; and when 
the falsehood was discovered, she had another ready 
to take its place. 

The queen, as Dr. Johnson said, possessed learn- 
ing enough to give dignity to a bishop, but her great 
ability lay in her intuitive perception of the needs of 
the age, and in her power of self-adjustment to them. 
She seemed to know an able man at sight, and she 
knew also how to attach him to her service. Prob- 
ably no sovereign ever had such a body of statesmen 
as her advisers, — such men as Cecil and Bacon and 
Walsingham. By their wise counsel she was able to 
weather all storms. It has been said that the next best 
thing to having a good rule is to understand when to 
break it. Elizabeth carried out this principle. Self- 
willed as she was, she saw the point where self-will 
became dangerous, and stopped. In her intercourse 
with Parliament she conceded even the monopolies 
of trade with which she had rewarded her favorites, 
when she found it inexpedient to keep them. 

Never was a ruler so popular and so praised. 
Spenser, Raleigh, Sidney, and Shakespeare united in 



OF ENGLISH HISTORY. 105 

compliments to her beauty, her wisdom, and her wit. 
She was the " Gloriana " of the Faery Queen ; the 
"bright and occidental star" of the prayer-book and 
the Bible; the "fair vestal in the West" of Mid- 
summer-Night's Dream ; and the " good Queen Bess " 
of the people. After her death at Greenwich, when 
her body was being conveyed up the Thames to 
Westminster, an extravagant eulogist declared that 
the very fishes that followed the funeral-barge " wept 
out their eyes and swam blind after ! " 

The reign of Elizabeth was in fact Europe's 
grandest age. It was a time when everything was 
bursting into life and color. The world had sud- 
denly grown larger. It had opened toward the East 
in the revival of classic learning, it had opened 
toward the West and disclosed a continent of un- 
known extent and unimaginable resources. More's 
fiction of " Utopia " seemed about to become real. 
It was an age of adventure, of poetry, of luxury, and 
of rapidly increasing wealth. When men looked 
across the Atlantic, their imaginations were stimu- 
lated, and no hopes appeared too good to be true. 
They dreamed of fountains of youth in Florida, of 
mines of gold in Brazil, of rivers whose pebbles 
were precious stones in Virginia. England, too, was 
undergoing transformation. Men were no longer 
content to live shut up in sombre castles, surrounded 
with moats, of stagnant water, or in wretched hovels 



106 THE LEADING FACTS 

where the smoke curled round the rafters and the 
wind whistled through the unglazed lattice windows. 
Mansion and manor houses like Hatfield, Knowle 
and the " Bracebridge Hall " 1 of Washington Irving, 
rose instead of castles ; and hospitality — not exclu- 
sion — became the prevailing custom. The intro- 
duction of chimneys brought the cheery comfort of 
the English fireside ; while, among the wealthy, 
carpets, tapestry, and silver plate took the place of 
floors strewed with rushes, of bare walls, and of 
tables covered with pewter dishes. 

An old writer, lamenting the innovation, says, 
"When our houses were built of willow, then had we 
oaken men ; but now that our houses are of oak, our 
men are not only become willow, but many are alto- 
gether of straw, which is a sore affliction." But they 
were not all of straw ; for that was the period when 
Chapman was translating the "Iliad," Spenser writing 
the "Faery Queen," Bacon meditating the "Induc- 
tive Philosophy," Shakespeare creating " Hamlet," 
Raleigh planting colonies in America, Drake " boldly 
singeing the beard of the king of Spain," or circum- 
navigating the globe with his little fleet; and Sidney 
lighting the League in the Netherlands, and giving 
his life for liberty. 

For England it was also an age of great and con- 
stant peril. Elizabeth's entire reign was under- 

1 i.e., Aston Hall, Aston Park, in the suburbs of Birmingham. 



OF ENGLISH HISTORY. 107 

mined with plots against her life and against the 
Protestant faith. No sooner was one detected and 
frustrated, than a new conspiracy began. From the 
outset, Mary, queen of Scots, had asserted her claim 
to the English crown, and had quartered the arms of 
England on her escutcheon. After her flight from 
Scotland, and while held as a political prisoner, she 
was found to be implicated in a plan for assassinat- 
ing the queen and seizing the reins of government 
in behalf of the Jesuits and Rome. 

William the Silent had fallen a victim to a similar 
plot ; and Elizabeth, roused to a sense of her danger, 
reluctantly signed her death-warrant, and Mary was 
beheaded at Fotheringay Castle. As soon as the 
news of her execution was brought to the queen, 
she acted with her usual duplicity, bitterly up- 
braided the ministers who had advised it, and throw- 
ing Davidson, her secretary, into the Tower, fined 
him £10,000, the payment of Avhich reduced him to 
beggary. Yet facts prove that not only had Eliza- 
beth determined to put Mary to death, a measure 
every way justifiable, but that she had even sug- 
gested to her keeper that it might be expedient to 
have her privately murdered, either by poison, as 
the Earl of Leicester had once suggested, or in some 
other way. 

Mary was hardly under ground when a new and 



108 THE LEADING FACTS 

greater danger threatened the country. Philip of 
Spain, who had covered Holland with the graves 
of Protestants, butchered by Alva, or buried alive 
by order of the Inquisition, had determined to 
invade England, conquer it, and restore it to the 
pope. To accomplish this he fitted out the " Grand 
Armada," an immense fleet, carrying twenty thou- 
sand soldiers, and intended to receive reinforcements 
of thirty thousand more from the Spanish army in 
the Netherlands. The expedition was armed with 
twenty-five hundred cannon ; and carried, it is said, 
shackles and instruments of torture to bind and 
punish the heretics whom its leader confidently 
expected to capture. When intelligence of these 
formidable preparations reached England, all parties, 
both Catholics and Protestants, rose and joined in 
defence of their country and their queen. 

Elizabeth reviewed the forces that had gathered 
to fight for her and for liberty, and said to them, 
" Though I have but the feeble body of a woman, 
I have the heart of a king, and of a king of England, 
too." When the long-looked-for fleet appeared, 
moving toward the coast, in the form of a crescent 
seven miles in length, Drake was ready to receive 
them. With his fast-sailing cruisers he sailed round 
the unwieldy Spanish galleons, firing four shots to 
their one ; and " harassing them as a swarm of wasps 



OF ENGLISH HISTORY. 109 

would a bear." Several of the enemy's ships were 
captured ; one blew up ; and at last the commander 
thought best to make for Calais to repair damages, 
and to take a fresh start. The English followed. 
As soon as night came on, Drake sent eight blazing 
fire-ships to drift down among the Armada as it lay 
at anchor. Thoroughly alarmed at the prospect of 
being burned where they lay, the Spaniards cut their 
cables and made sail for the north, hotly pursued by 
Drake, who might have cut them to pieces, had not 
Elizabeth's parsimony stinted the supply of powder. 
The wind increased to a gale ; the gale to a furious 
storm. As in such weather the Armada could not 
turn back, the commander attempted to go around 
Scotland, and return that way ; but ship after ship 
was driven ashore and wrecked on the wild and 
rocky coast. On one strand, less than five miles 
long, over a thousand corpses were counted, while 
the men who escaped were put to death by the in- 
habitants. Eventually, only about one-third of the 
fleet, half-manned by crews stricken by pestilence 
and death, succeeded in reaching Spain. Thus 
ended Philip's boasted attack on England ; and when 
all was over, Elizabeth went in state to St. Paul's, 
to offer thanks for the victory, afterward commem- 
orated by a medal which she caused to be struck, 
bearing the inscription, " God blew with his winds, 
and they were scattered." 



110 THE LEADING FACTS 

A few years later, Ireland, which had been half- 
vanquished by Henry II., and whose unfortunate 
people still remained semi-barbarians, submitted to 
the rule of England, — a barren victory which has 
proved a curse to both conqueror and conquered. 

In 1601, the first effective poor-law was passed, 
requiring each parish to make provision for such 
paupers as were unable to work, while the able- 
bodied were compelled to labor for their own sup- 
port. This measure relieved much of the distress 
which had prevailed during the two previous reigns, 
and is the basis of the law now enforced. 

The death of the great queen in 1603 was as sad 
as her life had been brilliant. Her favorite Essex, 
Shakespeare's intimate friend, 1 had been executed for 
an attempted rebellion against her power. From 
that time she grew, as she said, " heavy hearted." 
Her friends and counsellors were dead, and her 
people no longer welcomed her appearance with 
their former enthusiasm. Her strength gradually 
declined. At length she lay silent, propped up on 
cushions on the floor, in the attitude in which Dela- 
roche has painted her, "tired," as she said, "of 
reigning, and tired of life." In that sullen mood, 
and without naming a successor, she departed to 

1 After the death of Essex a marked change comes over Shake- 
speare's plays ; Hamlet, Lear, Macbeth and Caesar give expression 
to his sorrow and his conviction that " the times are out of joint." 



OF ENGLISH HISTORY. HI 

join that silent majority whose realm under earth is 
summed up in the two words, " hie jacet." " Four 
days afterward," says a writer of that day, "she was 
forgotten." One may see her tomb, with her full- 
length recumbent effigy, in the north aisle of Henry 
Seventh's chapel, and in the opposite aisle, the tomb 
and effigy of her old rival and enemy, Mary, queen 
of Scots ; the sculptured features of both look placid 
— "after life's fitful fever they sleep well." 



112 THE LEADING FACTS 



IX. 



" It is the nature of the devil of tyranny to tear and rend the body 
which he leaves." — Macaulay. 



o-oJ^JOO 

BEGINNING WITH THE DIVINE RIGHT OF KINGS, AND 
ENDING WITH THE DIVINE EIGHT OF THE PEOPLE. 

KING OR PARLIAMENT? 

The Race of Stuart, 1603-1619, 1660-1688, 1702-1714. 

James I., 1603-1625. Charles II., 1660-1085. 

Charles I., 1625-1649. James II., 1685-1688. 

The Commonwealth and William & Mary, 1689-1702. 

Protectorate, 1649-1660. Anne, 1702-1714. 

James was a man of small mind but of 

James I., 

1603-1625. unbounded conceit. He had been edu- 
cated, as the Duke of Wellington would say, beyond 
his intellect. He wrote on "kingcraft," "witch- 
craft," and "a counterblast" on that "Stygian 
weed," tobacco, then recently introduced into Eng- 
land, along with the more useful potato, by Sir 
Walter Raleigh. One of the earliest acts of his 
reign was to obtain the passage of a bill punishing 
witches with death. Under this law, many a 
wretched woman perished on the scaffold, whose 



OF ENGLISH HISTORY. 113 

only crime was that she was old, ugly, and friend- 
less. 

During Elizabeth's time that part of the population 
whose zeal in purifying the Protestant Church 
from all relics of popish rites, gained for them 
the name of Puritans, had been steadily increasing, 
so that Archbishop Whitgift said that he was amazed 
to find how "the vipers " had multiplied. On James's 
accession this body of believers presented a petition, 
bearing the names of over eight hundred ministers, 
asking that they might be permitted to dispense with 
the surplice, the sign of the cross in baptism, and the 
use of the ring in the marriage ceremony. The king 
convened a conference at Hampton Court, to consider 
the matter ; or rather to make a pedantic display of 
his theological learning, for James had come from 
Scotland thoroughly disgusted with the Puritans and 
their demands ; especially since one of their clergy- 
men in Edinburgh had seized him by the sleeve at a 
public meeting, and called him, with only too much 
truth, " God's silly vassal." 

James hated the Puritans because he believed that 
equality in the Church led to equality in the State." 
"No bishop, no king," was his theory. The Hamp- 
ton Court conference only widened the breach be- 
tween the established Church and the dissenters. 
After having declaimed against the petitioners with 



114 THE LEADING FACTS 

an unction, which one enthusiastic bishop declared 
to be inspired by the Holy Ghost, James broke up 
the meeting with the angry exclamation, "I will 
make them conform, or I will harry them out of the 
land." 

That rash threat, and the persecution which it 
initiated, produced results which were to influence 
profoundly the history not only of England, but New 
England as well. From that time certain farmers in 
Yorkshire and Lincolnshire, 1 becoming convinced 
that reform within the Chnrch was impracticable, 
determined to leave it and to go forth as pilgrims to 
set up an independent Church. With much difficulty 
and suffering they succeeded in escaping to Holland ; 
and in 1620 they set forth thence for that New 
World across the sea, which they hoped would re- 
dress the wrongs of the Old. Landing at Plymouth, 
in Massachusetts, they established a colony on the 
basis of "equal laws for the general good." Ten 
years later Winthrop followed with a small com- 
pany, and settled Salem and Boston, and during 
the next decade twenty thousand Englishmen found 
a refuge in the west. But to the little band who 
embarked under Bradford and Brewster, in the May- 
flower, the scene of whose landing at Plymouth is 
painted on the walls of the houses of parliament, be- 
1 Especially Scrooby, Yorkshire. 



OF ENGLISH HISTORY. 115 

longs the credit of the great undertaking. Of that 
enterprise, one of their brethren in England wrote, 
in the time of their severest distress, with prophetic 
foresight, "Let it not be grievous to you that you 
have been instruments to break the ice for others : 
the honor shall be yours to the world's end." 

As if with a desire of further alienating his people 
from him, James proclaimed the doctrine of the 
Divine Right of Kings. This theory, which was un- 
known to the English Constitution, declared that 
kings derive their power and right to rule directly 
from God, and in no way from the people. 1 "As it is 
atheism and blasphemy," he wrote, " to dispute what 
God can do, so it is a presumption and a high con- 
tempt in a subject to dispute what a king can do." 2 
All this would have been amusing, had it not been 
dangerous. With respect to the nation, James was 
like the dwarf, in the story, who, perched on the 
giant's shoulders, cries out, " See how big I am ! " 

Acting on this assumption, the king violated the 
privileges of the House of Commons, and imprisoned 
members who dared to criticise his course. The 
House protested, and the king seized the journal and 
tore out the record of the protest. 

It was this arbitrary spirit that alarmed Catholics 
and Protestants alike ; this alarm culminated in a plot 

1 "A Deo, rex ; a rege, lex." 2 "The true law of free monarchy." 



116 THE LEADING FACTS 

on the part of Guy Fawkes and others, to blow up 
parliament house with gunpowder, at a time when 
the king was to be present. The plot was discovered, 
and the conspirators executed; but the feeling of 
dislike continued to grow until, in the next reign, it 
burst out into the blood-red blossom of civil war. 

James, like all the Stuarts, suffered from a chronic 
lack of money. In order to get it, he sold peerages, 
created baronetcies, and as a last resort, compelled all 
persons who had an income of forty pounds or more 
derived from landed property, to accept knighthood 
or pay a heavy fine. This exaction was ridiculed by 
the wits of the time in the lines, — 

" He that hath forty pounds per annum 
Shall be promoted from the plow ; 
His wife shall take the wall of her grannum — 
Honor's sold so dog-cheap now." 

In 1611, the revised edition of the English Bible 
was published and dedicated to the king. The 
encouragement which he had given to the work 
stands out as the one sensible act of his reign. 

In 1618, Lord Chancellor Bacon was convicted by 
the House of Lords of having taken bribes in a chan- 
cery suit. He confessed the offence, but pleaded ex- 
tenuating circumstances, adding, " I beseech your 
lordships be merciful unto a broken reed." But Ba- 
con had been too servile a tool of James, and no 



OF ENGLISH HISTORY. 117 

mercy was to be granted. A heavy sentence was 
passed, of fine and imprisonment, which if fully ex- 
ecuted, would have caused his utter ruin ; but the 
king interposed, and his favorite escaped with a few 
days' confinement in the Tower. 

With Sir Walter Raleigh the result was different. 
He had been a prisoner for several years, on an un- 
founded charge of conspiracy. Influenced by motives 
of cupidity, James released him to go on an expedi- 
tion in search of gold to replenish the royal coffers. 
Raleigh's men, without his sanction, came into col- 
lision with the Spaniards on the coast of South 
America. 1 He failed in his enterprise, and brought 
back nothing. The Spanish king called on James for 
vengeance on a man against whom he had an old 
grudge. James revived the sentence passed on 
Raleigh fifteen years before, as a pretext for his exe- 
cution. His real motive undoubtedly was the hope 
that by sacrificing Raleigh, he should secure the hand 
of the Spanish Infanta for his son Charles. 

Raleigh died as More died, his last words a jest at 
death. His deeper feelings were expressed in the 
lines written the night before his judicial murder, — 

" Even such is Time, that takes on trust 
Our youth, our joys, our all we have, 

1 The king had treacherously informed the Spanish ambassador 
of Ealeigh's mission, and the collision was inevitable. 



118 THE LEADING FACTS 

And pays us but with age and dust ; 
Who in the dark and silent grave, 
"When we have wandered all our ways, 
Shuts up the story of our days. 
But from this earth, this grave, this dust, 
My God shall raise me up, I trust." 

As for James, when lie died, a victim to confirmed 
drunkenness and gluttony, the fittest epitaph would 
have been what the Due de Sully called him, " the 
wisest fool in Christendom." 

Charles i. ^he doctrine of the " right divine of kings 
1625-1649, to govern wrong," so zealously put forth by 
James, bore its full and fatal fruit in the career of his 
son. Unlike his father, Charles was by nature a 
gentleman. In his private and personal relations he 
was conscientious and irreproachable ; in public mat- 
ters he was just the reverse. This singular contrast 
— this double character, as it were — arose from the 
fact that as a man, Charles felt himself bound by 
truth and honor, but as a king he considered himself 
superior to such obligations. He began his reign 
with demands for money. Parliament declined to 
grant them unless the king would redress certain 
grievances of long standing. Charles refused all con- 
cessions, dissolved Parliament, and attempted to levy 
illegal taxes, and to extort loans. John Hampden, 
a farmer in Buckinghamshire, refused to lend his 



OF ENGLISH HISTORY. 119 

majesty the sum asked. For the refusal he was 
thrown into prison. This led to increased agitation 
and discontent. At length the king found himself 
forced to summon Parliament. Immediately on 
assembling they presented -to the king the Peti- 
tion of Right, 1 which was in substance simply a new 
reading of Magna Carta, and stipulated that no 
taxes should be levied without the consent of Parlia- 
ment, and that no one should be unlawfully impris- 
oned as Hampden had been. In it there was not an 
angry word ; but, as a member of the Commons de- 
clared, " We say no more than what a worm, trodden 
upon, would say if he could speak, ' I pray thee tread 
upon me no more.' " 2 

Charles refused to sign the Petition, but, finding 
that money could be got on no other terms, he at 
last gave his signature. But for Charles to pledge 
his royal word meant its direct and open violation. 
For eleven years the king ruled without a parliament, 
and through Strafford as the head of the State, with 
his Star-Chamber, and his scheme called " Thorough," 
and through Laud with his High Commission court, 
he exercised a crushing and merciless sj^stem of polit- 
ical and religious tyranny. 

To obtain means with which to equip a standing 
army, Charles forced the whole country to pay a tax 

1 See Section XII. 32. 

2 Bisset, Commonwealth of England. 



120 THE LEADING FACTS 

known as " ship money." In time of war such an 
impost on the coast towns would have been legit- 
imate, since the original object of it was to provide 
ships for the national defence. But when the coun- 
try was at peace, such a demand could not be right- 
fully made, and for that reason John Hampden again 
resisted payment, and was again imprisoned; but 
when brought to trial, was fully acquitted. 

In 1637, the king determined to force the use of the 
English liturgy on the Scotch Church ; but no sooner 
had the Dean of Edinburgh opened the book than a 
general cry arose in the church, " A pope ! a pope ! 
Antichrist ! stone him ! " When the bishop endeav- 
ored to appease the tumult, and to read the prayer 
from the obnoxious book, the enraged congregation 
clapped and yelled, and an old woman hurled her 
stool at his head, shouting, " D'ye mean to say mass 
at my lug (ear) ! " Riots ensued, and eventually 
matters became so serious that the king resolved to 
compel the Scots to accept his liturgy at the point of 
the bayonet. He collected an army for that purpose, 
but soon found that he had no funds to pay them. 
As a last resort he summoned that memorable parlia- 
ment which from its continued session of thirteen 
years received the name of the Long Parliament. 

The spirit of this parliament soon showed itself. 
They impeached Strafford for his many years of des- 



OF ENGLISH HISTORY. 121 

potic oppression, and sent him to the block ; they 
abolished the Star-chamber and the High Commission 
Courts ; they passed a bill requiring that Parliament 
be summoned once in three years ; they condemned 
Laud to death ; they drew up the Remonstrance, a 
measure which set forth the faults of the king's gov- 
ernment, while it declared their distrust of his policy ; 
finally, they enacted a law forbidding the dissolution 
of Parliament, except with its own consent. 

Matters had now reached a climax, and Charles 
ordered the Commons to give up the five members 
(Hampden, Pym, and three others) who led the 
opposition. The request was not complied with, and 
the next day the king entered the House of Par- 
liament with an armed force to seize them. 1 They 
had been forewarned, and had left the House, taking 
refuge in the city, which showed itself then, as 
always, on the side of liberty. 

The king, baffled in his purpose, resolved to coerce 
Parliament by military force. He left London in 
1642, never to return, until he came as a prisoner of 
the power he had insulted and defied. The war 
began with the battle of Edgehill, Leicestershire, 
and was, at first, favorable to the king. On his side 
were a great majority of the nobility, the clergy, and 

1 See Copley's fine picture in the Art-Room of the Boston Public 
Library. 



122 THE LEADING FACTS 

the country gentlemen, known collectively as Cava- 
liers. On the side of Parliament were the tradesmen, 
the yeomanry, and a few men of rank. They were 
called in ridicule the Roundheads, from the Puritan 
fashion of wearing the hair closely cropped. Taking 
England, as a whole, we may say that the eastern 
half, with London, was against the king, and that 
the western half was for him. 

The war continued six years, but on the field of 
Marston-moor, in 1644, the north of England was 
conquered by Cromwell, with his re-organized army ; 
and in the following year, his psalm-singing " Iron- 
sides," who " trusted in God and kept their powder 
dry," gained the great victory of Naseby, in the mid- 
lands, which practically ended the war. 

Shortly after this, the king was surrendered by the 
Scotch, to whom he had fled, and was brought to 
Hampton Court. Here Parliament attempted to open 
negotiations with him. But, politically speaking, 
Charles was false to the core ; and, as Carlyle has 
said, " a man whose word will not inform you at all 
what he means or will do, is not a man you can bar- 
gain with. You must get out of that man's way, or 
put him out of yours." 

The Puritans were now divided into two factions, — 
the Presbyterians, or moderate party, and the Inde- 
pendents, or radicals. The former were in favor of 



OF ENGLISH HISTORY. 123 

limiting the power of the king by constitutional 
checks ; the latter, with Cromwell at their head, 
wished to set up a republican form of government. 

In 1648, all attempts to establish a solid and last- 
ing treaty of peace having failed, the army grew im- 
patient of parliamentary tactics, and at Cromwell's 
command, Colonel Pride proceeded to purge that body 
of all who still favored the continuance of negotia- 
tions. The members who remained were Independ- 
ents, and were called, in derision, the Rump. On Jan. 
20, 1649, the king was brought to trial, and a week 
later the court sentenced him to death as a "tyrant, 
traitor, murderer, and public enemy." Throughout 
the trial Charles conducted himself with dignity and 
self-possession. He was executed in front of the 
royal palace of Whitehall. "A great shudder ran 
through the crowd that saw the deed ; then a shriek ; 
then all immediately dispersed." 

On the afternoon of the 30th of January, 

The Common- 
wealth and 1649, while the crowd that had witnessed 

Protectorate, the execution of Charles were slowly leav- 
ing the spot, the Commons passed an act 
"prohibiting the proclaiming of any person to be 
king of England or Ireland, or the dominions thereof." 
A few weeks later they abolished the House of Lords, 
as " useless and dangerous." England was now nom- 
inally governed by a council of forty-one members, 



124 THE LEADING FACTS 

but the power was really held by Oliver Cromwell. 
Under the new order of things all members of the 
Commons, and those who held office or military rule 
were required to swear allegiance to the Common- 
wealth " without king or House of Lords." The use 
of the English Church service was forbidden. The 
statues of Charles, in the city, were demolished. 
The Great Seal of England was broken, and a new 
one substituted, on one side of which was a map of 
England and Ireland ; on the other was the House of 
Commons in session, with the legend, " In the first 
year of freedom, by God's blessing restored, 1648." 

But the Commonwealth, even with Cromwell as 
leader of its forces, had no easy task before it. It 
had enemies in the Royalists, and enemies in the 
wild, fanatic, half-crazed men of its own party. Com- 
munists, come-outers, and " all other cattle and 
creeping things " abounded. Their object was the 
destruction of rank, and private property, prepar- 
atory to a millenium, in which there should be an 
"equal division of unequal earnings." With such 
people Cromwell's course was necessarily summary, 
especially as some of them threatened him with 
assassination, with the view of ushering in the im- 
mediate personal reign of Christ ! 

In the north, Charles's son had been proclaimed 
king, and in the brave Montrose, and others like him, 



OF ENGLISH HISTORY. 125 

had better friends than he deserved. 1 The king 
rallied a small force to defend his claim, but his 
army was defeated at Dunbar and at Worcester. 
After the last battle he hid himself for a day in 
the "Royal Oak" at Boscobel, then in friendly 
manor-houses, and, after many narrow escapes, suc- 
ceeded in getting out of the country. • 

In 1653, finding that Parliament was becoming 
jealous of his increasing power, Cromwell deter- 
mined to secure a House in full sympathy with 
himself and his army. Sir Harry Vane, a member 
of " the Rump," feeling that the liberty of the 
nation was in danger of falling into the hands of 
a military dictator, had presented a bill for the 
better representation of the country. Hearing of 
this, Cromwell entered the House, at the head of a 
squad of soldiers, and, crying out, " Sir Harry Vane ! 
Sir Harry Vane ! good Lord, deliver me from Sir 
Harry Vane ! " he drove out the members of the 
House, hurling at them, as they passed, epithets of 
" drunkard, " glutton," " extortioner," and other 
unmentionable names. When all were gone, he 
locked the door, and put the key in his pocket. 

Cromwell now called a new parliament of his 
own choosing, limited to one hundred and twenty- 

1 See Aytoun's stirring ballad, The Execution of Montrose, and 
Sir Walter Scott's Tales of a Grandfather. 



126 THE LEADING FACTS 

eight members, and known as the " Barebone's Par- 
liament," from a leather-seller named Praise-God 
Barebone, who was a member of it. By the Instru- 
ment of Government, Cromwell was soon afterward 
declared Lord Protector of England. His intention 
was to seize the crown; but, finding the army 
opposed to such a step, he relinquished his pur- 
pose. 

He proved himself to be a protector, not only 
of the British realm, but of the Protestants of 
Europe ; and when no other power could have 
saved them from persecution, he did. In an age 
when Puritan fanaticism went all lengths, even, as 
Hudibras said, " to killing of a cat on Monday, 
for catching of a rat on Sunday " ; when it was a 
sin to eat mince-pie at Christmas, or to dance round 
a May-pole ; when the theatres were closed, and 
mirth was ungodly ; when it was a sign of sanctity 
to wear sad-colored raiment, and to talk through 
the nose ; when bear-baiting was prohibited, " not 
because it gave pain to the bear, but because it 
gave pleasure to the spectator," — in such an age, 
Cromwell showed exceptional moderation and good 
sense. 

Under his rule, the country prospered, and the 
English forces gained victories by land and sea, at 
home and abroad. During Cromwell's government, 



OF ENGLISH HISTORY. 127 

Protestant missionaries were first sent from England 
to convert the red-men of America, who were sup- 
posed to be a remnant of the lost tribes of Israel. 
On the other hand, there are few of the cathedrals 
or parish churches of England that do not testify 
to the hatred of Romanism, and of all that even 
remotely savored of Romanism, on the part of Crom- 
well and his men, in their empty niches, remnants 
of stained glass, and their mutilated tombs, broken, 
hacked, and hewed by the pikes and swords of 
infuriated soldiers. 

After being king, and even more, in all but 
name, during five years, Cromwell died, Sept. 3, 
1658, on the anniversary of the victories of Dunbar 
and of Worcester. At the hour of his death, one of 
the most fearful storms was raging that ever swept 
over England, — a fit accompaniment, as it seemed 
to many, to the end of such a life. 

If Cromwell was, as he has often been called, a 
usurper and a tyrant, he was so, not for his own, but 
for his country's good. In such a case, the motive is 
all-in-all. He was a rugged man, not lacking in dig- 
nity, but caring little for the smooth proprieties of life. 
In whatever he did he was eminently practical, — he 
went straight to the heart of matters, When the 
ship is foundering or on fire, or the crew has muti- 
nied, it will not avail to sit in the cabin and discuss 



128 THE LEADING FACTS 

abstract theories. Something must be clone, and 
that promptly. In an age of faction, wrangling and 
uncertainty, when the very foundations of society 
seemed to be giving way, Cromwell saw that if the 
country was to be kept together, it must be by 
decided measures which no precedent, law or con- 
stitution justified, but which stood justified, none 
the less, by the exigency of the times, by his con- 
scious rectitude of purpose and by the result. If 
there is any truth in Napoleon's maxim, that the 
tools belong to him who can use them, then Crom- 
well had a God-given right to rule, for, first, he had 
the ability, and, next, he employed it, all things 
considered, on the side of order and of justice. 

Richard was the son of the Protector, 
Cromwell *° wnom hi s father's death consigned his 
Sept. 3, 1658- father's work. He was an amiable, in- 

April 22,1659. i i • v • i i l t 

r capable individual, possessed ol as many 

negative qualities as his father had positive. The 
army soon recognized his unfitness, and requested 
him to resign the protectorship, which he did, not 
only without remonstrance, but apparently, with a 
sense of relief at being eased of a burden too heavy 
for his weak shoulders to carry. To the people he 
was henceforth familiarly known as "Tumble-down 
Dick." He was pensioned off with a moderate 
income, and lived in obscurity. Years after his 



OF ENGLISH HISTORY. 129 

abdication he visited Westminster, and when the 
attendant, who did not recognize him, showed him 
the throne, he said, " Yes ; I have not seen that 
chair since I sat in it in 1659." 

In 1660 the Royalists and Presbyterians united to 
summon a new parliament, known as the " Conven- 
tion Parliament," from its not having been regularly 
elected. By this body Charles II., who was then on 
the continent, was recalled to the throne. 

He was received at Dover with the wildest demon- 
Charles II., strations of joy, and his journey to London 
1660-1685. was a triumphal progress. He soon revealed 
his character through his court. His chief favorite 
and adviser was the dissolute Earl of Rochester, — 
he who wrote on the door of the king's bed-cham- 
ber : — 

" Here lies our sovereign lord the king, 

Whose word no man relies on ; 
He never says a foolish thing, 
Nor ever does a wise one." 

To which Charles, on reading it, retorted, " 'Tis true, 
because my words are my own, but my acts are my 
minister's." 

The new king was in every respect the antithesis 
of Cromwell. Charles had no love of country, no 
sense of duty, no belief in man or respect for woman. 
The single aim of his life was enjoyment. He desired 
to be king in order that he might have every means 



130 THE LEADING FACTS 

for accomplishing that aim. In this, Charles un- 
doubtedly represented a large part of the people. 
The Puritan policy had been pushed too far, and 
the attempt to reduce the whole of life to a sour 
asceticism had signally failed. Now the reaction had 
set in, and the lower and earthly side of human 
nature — none the less human because it is at the 
bottom and not at the top — took its fall revenge. 
Profligacy became the fashion ; and the popular lit- 
erature of that day will not bear the light. The 
cabinet was like the king — as Guizot has said, 1 it 
was a government of debauchees. It began, indeed, 
decently and ably, with Clarendon ; but in a few 
years it had degenerated into an administration by 
five leaders, called the Cabal, 2 whose character and 
deeds were such that Milton, as it is believed, took 
them as fit types of that council of "infernal peers," 
Moloch, Belial, Mammon, Beelzebub and Satan, who 
met to plot the ruin of the world. 3 

Among the earliest acts of Charles's reign was 
the passage of severe measures 4 against the Non- 

1 "Les roues, les libertins formerent le ministere qu'on appela 
le ministere de la cabale." — Guizot, Hist, de la Civilization. 

2 The word is formed of the initials of their names, — Clifford, 
Ashley, Buckingham, Arlington, Laudersdale. 

3 See Paradise Lost, I. and II. And compare Dryden's Absalom 
and Achitophel. 

4 i.e., the Act of Uniformity, the Conventicle Act and the Eive- 
Mile Act. See Section XII. 



OF ENGLISH HISTORY. 131 

conformists, by which two thousand Presbyterian 
ministers were driven from their parishes and re- 
duced to great distress ; while in Scotland, Claver- 
house hanged and drowned the Covenanters for their 
faith. 1 

Among multitudes who suffered under these and 
similar acts was a certain laborer named John Bun- 
yan, who, being convicted of having " devilishly and 
perniciously abstained from coming to church," was 
committed for twelve years to Bedford jail — that 
squalid " Derm " 2 whose misery he forgot, in his 
dream of a pilgrimage from this world to the next ; 
thus proving, as Milton did, in the proscription and 
poverty which he suffered, that 

" The mind is its own place, and in itself 
Can make a heaven of hell." 

In 1665, a terrible plague broke out in London, 
which has been graphically described in a work of 
fiction by Defoe, and which carried off a hundred 
thousand victims within six months. It was fol- 
lowed, in 1666, by a fire which Evelyn, who wit- 
nessed it, said " was not to be outdone until the 

1 See Sir Walter Scott's Tales of a Grandfather. 

2 "As I walk'd through the wilderness of this world, I lighted on 
a certain place, where was a Denn ; and I laid me clown in that place 
to sleep: And as I slept I dreamed a Dream." — The Pilgrim's 
Progress, edition of 1678. 



132 THE LEADING FACTS 

final conflagration." By it " London as a city was 
obliterated," nothing being left but a fringe of 
houses on the north-east. Great as the calamity was, 
yet, from a sanitary point of view, it did immense 
service, for it swept away miles of streets crowded 
with buildings foul with the accumulated filth of 
ages. A monument near London bridge marks the 
spot where the fire began. For many years it bore 
an inscription affirming that the Catholics kindled 
the flames, — a falsehood which Pope exposed in the 
lines : — 

" Where London's column, pointing to the skies, 
Like a tall bully lifts its head and lies." 

Sir Christopher Wren rebuilt the city. He lies bur- 
ied under the grand dome of St. Paul's, his own 
grandest work. On his grave are the words, "Lec- 
tor, si monumentum requiris, circumspice ! "- 1 

In 1G70, Charles signed the secret treaty of Dover. 
It was his great ambition to make himself indepen- 
dent of Parliament, but without money he could not 
effect this. To get it, he deliberately and shame- 
lessly sold himself as a tool to Louis XIY. of France 
in consideration of a bribe of two hundred thousand 
pounds, in return for which, Charles declared him- 

1 " Reader, if you seek his monument, look around ! " The in- 
scription is repeated in the transept of the cathedral, over the North 
door. 



OF ENGLISH HISTORY. 133 

self ready to publicly profess the Roman Catholic 
religion, and to aid the king of France in his attack 
on the liberty of Holland and the destruction of 
Protestantism. 

True to his promise, Charles provoked a war with 
the Dutch, but found that more money would be 
needed. Not knowing where to borrow, he resolved 
to steal it. In the exchequer there were then lying- 
various deposits, made by prominent London mer- 
chants and bankers, amounting to one million three 
hundred thousand pounds. The king seized this, 
thus ruining those who had trusted him, and causing 
a financial panic which shook London to its foun- 
dations. 

Meanwhile the growing discontent with Charles's 
oppressive measures, which became steadily worse, 
bred plots against his life, and that of his brother 
James, the Duke of York, who, in case of Charles's 
death would succeed him. While these were hatching, 
an infamous scoundrel, named Titus Oates, pretended 
that? he had discovered that the Catholics were con- 
spiring to destroy London. With the remembrance 
of the great fire still fresh in mind, the people were 
roused to intense excitement, and a great number of 
eminent persons were arrested and executed. A bill 
was passed excluding Roman Catholics from both 
Houses of Parliament, and an attempt was afterwards 



134 THE LEADING FACTS 

made to debar the Duke of York, who was an avowed 

Romanist, from the succession. 

A few years later a Protestant conspiracy, known 

i 
as the Rye-house Plot, was accidentally discovered. 

Its object was the murder of Charles and his brother 
James, in order to secure the throne to the Protestant 
party. Algernon Sidney and Lord Russell, who were 
known to have favored the bill which excluded 
James, were arrested, and, on insufficient evidence, 
were condemned to death. " Russell died with the 
fortitude of a Christian ; Sidney, with the fortitude 
of a Stoic." 

During Charles's reign the Royal Society was 
founded. In an age when alchemy and witchcraft 
were still believed in, the establishment of an asso- 
ciation for the promotion of science was a significant 
event. Under its encouragement that great work 
was published which demonstrates the law which 
governs the falling of an apple, and the movements 
of the planets in their orbits. 

" Nature and nature's laws lay hid in night ; 
God said, 'Let Newton be,' and all was light." 

The two chief political measures of Charles's 
reign were the Habeas Corpus Act, wdiich provided 
that no subject should be detained in prison except 
by due process of law, and the abolition by statute 
of the last vestige of feudalism. 



OF ENGLISH HISTORY. 135 

In 1685 the end came. Evelyn tells us that on 
Sunday evening, the last of January of that year, he 
was present at the Court of Whitehall and saw Charles 
sitting in the grand banqueting room (now a Chapel 
Royal), " chatting and toying with three women, 
whose charms were the boast, and whose vices were 
the disgrace, of three nations, while a crowd of cour- 
tiers were gathered round a gambling-table heaped 
with gold. Six days after all was in the dust." 
James II. James's first great ambition was to rule 

1685-1688. without a parliament ; his second, which 
was still nearer his heart, was to restore the Roman 
Catholic religion in England. "This was his con- 
suming passion ; it stood him in the stead of every 
other faith." "On Easter Sunday," writes Macau- 
lay, " the worship of the Church of Rome was once 
more, after an interval of a hundred and twenty 
years, performed at Westminster with regal splen- 
dor." 

During the discontent and alarm that these pro- 
ceedings caused, James, Duke of Monmouth, a nat- 
ural son of Charles II., landed in the South of 
England with a small force which he had gathered 
on the continent, and proclaimed himself king. 
Many of the country people rallied to his support, 
but in the battle of Sedgemoor, Monmouth's army 
was utterly routed. Monmouth, himself, was soon 



136 THE LEADING FACTS 

after captured, sent to the Tower and executed. 
His body was buried in that little chapel of St. 
Peter's, 1 of which, it has been said that " there is no 
sadder spot on earth, since there death is associated 
with whatever is darkest in human nature and in 
human destiny." The engagement at Sedgeinoor 
was the last deserving the name of battle that has 
been fought on English ground. 

The defeat and death of Monmouth was followed 
by " the bloody assizes," or English reign of terror, 
conducted by the infamous Judge Jeffreys, who de- 
lighted, as he said, in giving all who were so unfor- 
tunate as to come before him, " a lick with the 
rough side of his tongue," previous to roaring out 
the cruel sentence of torture or death, in which he 
delighted yet more. 

All who were implicated in the late rising were 
hunted down and brought to a trial which was a 
mockery of justice. No one was allowed to defend 
himself ; in fact, defence would have been useless 
against the blind ferocity of such a court. A gen- 
tleman present at one of these scenes of slaughter, 
touched with pity at the condition of a trembling 
old man called up for sentence, ventured to inter- 
pose a word in his behalf. " My lord," said he, 
" this poor creature is on the parish." " Do not 
1 i.e., St. Peter Ad Vincula, within the walls of the Tower. 



OF ENGLISH HISTOKY. 187 

trouble yourself," cried the judge ; " I will soon 
ease the parish of the burden ! " and ordered the 
poor wretch to the gallows forthwith. 

A young man was sentenced to be imprisoned 
seven years, and to be whipped once a year through 
all the market towns in Dorsetshire. He petitioned 
the king to grant him the favor of being hanged, 
and was refused ; but a partial remission of the 
punishment was at length gained by bribes. 

Alice Lisle, an aged woman who had concealed 
two men flying from the king's vengeance, was 
condemned to be burned alive ; and it was with diffi- 
culty that the clergy of Winchester cathedral suc- 
ceeded in getting the sentence commuted to behead- 
ing. As the work went on, " Jeffreys's spirits," says 
Macaulay, " rose higher and higher ; he laughed, 
shouted, joked and swore like a drunken man." 
When the circuit was finished, more than a thousand 
persons had been brutally whipped, sold into slavery 
or hanged. The guide-posts of the highways were 
converted into gibbets, and from every church-tower 
in Somersetshire a ghastly head looked down on 
those who gathered there to worship God. So many 
were the bodies exposed, that the whole air was 
tainted with corruption and death. 

On Jeffreys's return from this carnival of blood, 
James expressed his approval by making him Lord 



138 THE LEADING FACTS 

Chancellor, his only censure being that he had not 
shown sufficient severity. 

In 1688, the king, in order to bring the great 
institutions of learning under the control of the 
Catholics, ordered the Fellows of Magdalen College, 
Oxford, to choose a president of that faith. They 
refused to obey him, and elected a Protestant. For 
this act they were ejected from the college, and had 
to depend on the charity of neighboring country 
gentlemen for subsistence. Having gained a partial 
victory at Oxford, James next issued a Declaration 
of Indulgence, abolishing all religious tests. The 
object of this apparent measure of toleration was to 
put Papists, then legally excluded from holding any 
office, into positions of trust and power. A royal 
proclamation commanded that the Declaration should 
be read on a given Sunday in all the churches. 
Seven bishops remonstrated and declined to order 
their clergy to comply with the king's command. 
When the day came, hardly a minister read the 
paper ; and in the few cases in which it was done, 
the congregation rose and left the church. Furious 
at the result, James sent the refractory bishops to 
the Tower. On their trial the popular feeling in 
their favor was so strong, that not even the servile 
court dared to convict them. The news of their 
acquittal was received in London with shouts of joy, 
bonfires and illuminations. 



OF ENGLISH HISTORY. 139 

Affairs had now reached a crisis ; and on the very 
day that the bishops were set at liberty, seven of the 
leading nobility and gentry, representing both politi- 
cal parties, seconded by the city of London, sent a 
secret invitation to William, prince of Orange, at 
the Hague, urging him to come over to England and 
accept the crown. 

William came with an army of fourteen thousand 
men. The king endeavored to rally a force to meet 
him ; but his troops deserted, and even his daughter 
Anne went over to the enemy. "Now God help 
me!" exclaimed James in despair; "for my own chil- 
dren forsake me ! " and throwing the great Seal of 
State into the Thames, he fled to France, to find 
protection at the court of Versailles. 1 

Never was a revolution of such magnitude accom- 
plished so peacefully. Not a drop of blood was 
shed. Even the bronze statue of James was allowed 
to stand in the rear of Whitehall, where it still re- 
mains. The fulness of time had come. Old things 
were passing away ; all was becoming new. Hence- 
forth we hear no more of punishments inflicted 
on account of religious belief or political opinion. 
Courts of justice were no longer to be, in Hallam's 
expressive phrase, "little better than caverns of mur- 

1 Respecting the king's life at Versailles, see Doran's Monarchs 
retired from Business. 



140 THE LEADING FACTS 

derers," where judges browbeat those arraigned 
before them, took their guilt for granted, and fined 
and imprisoned juries for daring to bring in a verdict 
contrary to their wish. 1 The agony of the " boot " 
and the thumbscrew, which James delighted to wit- 
ness, the fetid dungeon in which men slowly rotted — 
these had had their day and were never to reappear. 

For the future, thought in England was to be 
free; and perhaps the coward king's heaviest retri- 
bution, in his secure retreat beyond the sea, was the 
knowledge that all his efforts, to prevent it from 
becoming so, had wholly failed. 

William m After the flight of James II., a parlia- 
and Mary, ment was called, which declared the throne 
1689-1702. yacantj an( j William and Mary were in- 
vited to reign jointly, the actual administration being 
vested in the former. 

In order clearly to define the rights of the people 
and the prerogative of the crown, the Declaration 
of Rights was drawn up, and signed by both king and 
queen. This declaration was afterward embodied 
in the Bill of Eights, 2 which became a law in 1689. 
By the provisions of that bill, standing armies in 

1 See Introduction to Prof. Adams's Manual of Historical Litera- 
ture; and for a graphic picture of the times, read in Bunyan's Pil- 
grim's Progress, Christian's trial before Lord Hategood. 

2 See Section XII. 64. 



OF ENGLISH HISTORY. 141 

time of peace, and levies of money without the 
consent of Parliament were forbidden. The right 
of petition was guaranteed; the frequent assembling 
of Parliament, and freedom of discussion were 
secured, and the king was debarred from interfer- 
ing with the execution of the laws. 

Foremost in the list of benefits which England 
owes to the revolution should be placed the Tolera- 
tion Act, which protected all Protestant sects in 
liberty to worship God according to the dictates 
of conscience. Next, Parliament established the 
rule that all money, voted for the supply and sup- 
port of government, should be applied to the service 
specified in the vote. That statute gave to the 
House of Commons the full control of the purse, 
and made it, what it has ever since really been, the 
paramount power of the State. 1 

The next great blessing, conferred b}^ the revolu- 
tion, was the purification of the administration of 
justice in political cases (to which reference has 
already been made). But of all the reforms pro- 
duced by the change of government, perhaps none 
has proved more extensively useful than the estab- 
lishment of the liberty of the press, for which Milton 
had earnestly but vainly labored, declaring that, 
" while he who kills a man, kills a reasonable crea- 

1 Macaulay. 



142 THE LEADING FACTS 

ture ; • • • he who destroys a good book, kills reason 
itself." 1 

Following the abolition of restriction on printing 
came the establishment of newspapers, — " an 
event," to use Macaulay's words, " of far greater 
importance than the achievements of William's army 
or of Russell's fleet." 

In 1690, James II., aided by Louis XIV., landed 
in Ireland, besieged Londonderry, unsuccessfully, 
and w^as finally defeated at the decisive battle of 
the Boyne, where William commanded in person. 
The pusillanimous behavior of James on this occa- 
sion excited the scorn of both the French and the 
Irish. " Change kings with us ! " shouted an Irish 
officer to one of William's men, " change kings with 
us, and we'll fight you again." 

Ten years later the English fleet gained the vic- 
tory of La Hogue over the French. The continen- 
tal wars of William continued five } T ears longer, 
until, by the Peace of Ryswick, 1697, Louis XIV. 
recognized him as king of England. It marked the 
end of the conspiracy between Louis and the 
Stuarts to turn England into a Roman Catholic 
country, and a dependency of France. 

When William went to return thanks for the 
peace, it was to the new Saint Paul's, which Wren 

1 Milton's Areopagitica. 



OF ENGLISH HISTORY. 143 

had just completed, and which was then used for 
the first time for public worship. 

In 1701, Parliament passed the Act of Settlement, 
which secured a Protestant succession to the throne, 
in the line of the Princess Sophia of Hanover, a 
descendant of James I., exception being made in favor 
of the issue of William III. and of Anne. This most 
important measure practically abolished the principle 
of hereditary succession, and established the sover- 
eignty of Parliament. By these two acts — the Bill of 
Rights and the Act of Settlement 1 — the right of the 
people to depose the king, to change the order of 
succession, and to set upon the throne whom they 
would, was established. " An English sovereign 
is now as much the creature of an act of Parliament 
as the pettiest tax-gatherer in his realm." 2 

According to Guizot, William's real object in 
accepting the English crown was to draw the nation 
into an alliance with Holland against Louis XIV., 
who was bent on destroying religious and political 
liberty on the continent. The constant wars be- 
tween England and France, which followed William's 
accession, laid the foundation of the National Debt. 
One other thing he established, more widely known 
than his greatest victories — that institution in 

1 See Section XII. 64 and 70. 

2 Green, History of the English People. 



144 THE LEADING FACTS 

Threadneedle Street, London, in one of whose courts 
stands a statue dedicated in 1734 to the memory of 
the best of princes, William of Orange, founder of 
the Bank of England. William died in 1702, a few 
years after the loss of his beloved wife. His personal 
record is a remarkable one. Through, a life which 
was one long disease, the force of his mind, says 
Macaulay, never failed on any great occasion to bear 
up his suffering and languid body. 
Amifi Anne, sister of Mary, and daughter of 

1702-1714. James II. "When in good humor, she 
was meekly stupid ; and when in ill-humor, sulkily 
stupid;" but, says Stanhope, if there was any person 
in England duller than her majesty, that person was 
her majesty's consort, Prince George of Denmark. 
Anne had seventeen children, all of whom died in 
infancy, except one unfortunate, sickly son, who lived 
just long enough to awaken hopes that were buried 
with him. The queen inherited, along with some 
amiable qualities, the obstinacy, the prejudices, and 
the superstitions of her race. She was the last sover- 
eign who declared her faith in the Divine Right of 
kings, the last who believed that the royal hand 
could dispel disease, and who publicly announced 
in the London Gazette her intention of " touching " 
for the cure of the "king's evil" or scrofula. 1 Her 
reign has been characterized as one of corruption in 

1 London Gazette, March 12, 1712. 



OF ENGLISH mSTORY. 145 

high places, and brutality in low ; but from a literary 
point of view it shone with the mild splendor of 
Addison, Defoe and Pope, the lurid light of Swift, 
and it saw the names of Fielding and of Hume 
appear above the horizon. Aside from this, it was 
an age of contented dullness, in which country gen- 
tlemen of the Roger de Coverly type existed as 
ideals, not facts. 

So far as the crown was concerned, the real power, 
though in Anne's name, was in the hands of the 
Duchess of Marlborough, whose imperious temper 
carried all before her, and who ruled the queen in 
everything from questions of State to details of dress. 
Eventually they quarrelled, and the Duchess was 
superseded by a Mrs. Masham, who likewise attained 
well-nigh absolute control over her royal mistress. 
Her influence led to the dismissal of the Whig min- 
isters, to the reversal of their war-policy, and to the 
Peace of Utrecht. Thus it was that " the insolence 
of one waiting-woman, and the cunning of another, 
changed the future of Europe." 

Politically, the country was divided between the 
Whigs and the Tories, two great parties, which origi- 
nated during the latter part of the reign of Charles 
II. (about 1680). They may, perhaps, be regarded 
as the political successors of the Roundheads and 
the Cavaliers of the period of the civil war, and as 
the predecessors of the Liberals and the Conserva- 



146 THE LEADING FACTS 

tives of the present day. The policy of the former 
party has always tended to limit the power of the 
Crown, of the latter to limit that of the people. The 
Whigs were pledged to maintain the Act of Settle- 
ment passed in the previous reign, and thereby, after 
Anne's death, to exclude the Stuarts from the throne. 
The Tories were determined to keep peace with the 
Catholic powers of Europe and to restore the Stuarts. 
The Whigs adhered to Low Church, the Tories to 
High Church, principles ; and thus to the bitterness 
of political strife was added the yet more acrid bit- 
terness of theological dispute.- Addison tells an 
amusing story of a boy who was called a popish 
cur by a member of one party for inquiring for St. 
Ann's Lane, and cuffed for irreverence by another 
when he asked for Ann's Lane. 

The leading men of both parties were utterly 
untrustworthy. They were false to their avowed 
principles and false to those who depended on them. 
To read the life of Marlborough, or the history of 
Anne's ministers, is to follow a tangled web of plots 
and counterplots till baseness and treachery can go 
no further. 

From the beginning of her reign Anne was 
involved in a war with France. Louis XIV. was 
engaged in an attempt to place his grandson on the 
throne of Spain, declaring that there " should be no 
more Pyrenees," but that the two countries should 



OF ENGLISH HISTORY. 147 

be one. He had also publicly recognized the son of 
James II. as the legitimate king of England, and 
bound himself to support his claim with both money 
and arms. The project dragged England, and ulti- 
mately nearly all Europe, into the War of the Spanish 
Succession 1 — a war to maintain the balance of power 
which the success of France would destroy. The 
war ended only a short time before the queen's 
death. John Churchill, Duke of Marlborough, com- 
manded the English forces. He was the ablest 
general, with a single exception, that ever led an 
English army ; brilliantly successful in war, but 
avaricious, unscrupulous and perfidious. He owed 
the beginning of his fortunes to court intrigues. 

In 1704 Marlborough gained the victory of Blen- 
heim, which was followed by the taking of Gibraltar 
and by other successes on the continent. 2 

Peace was re-established by the Treaty of Utrecht 
in 1713. By this treaty a compromise was effected. 
Louis gained a part of his object, not by force of 
arms, but by the death of Eugene of Germany ; and 
England gained the right of supplying the Spanish 
colonies in America with negro slaves. This lucra- 
tive traffic England had long eagerly coveted. In 
Elizabeth's time, Sir John Hawkins entered into 
it with his ship "Jesus," and pursued it with such 

1 See Maeaulay's Essays. 

2 See Thackeray's Henry Esmond. 



148 THE LEADING FACTS 

profit that in a few years he was able to set up 
a coat of arms, emblazoned with a slave bound hand 
and foot, emblematic of the source of his distinction. 

Although since the accession of James, England 
and Scotland had been ruled by one sovereign, they 
had continued to hold separate parliaments. In 
1706 they were united under the name of Great 
Britain, and from that date Scotland has been repre- 
sented in Parliament by a fixed number of peers and 
of members of the House of Commons. 

It was during the reign of Anne that the first daily 
newspaper was issued in England — the " Daily Cour- 
ant " — a dingy sheet, little bigger than a man's hand, 
which the publisher said he had made so small " to 
save the Publick at least half the Impertinences of 
Ordinary News-Papers." Perhaps it was well he did; 
for since it had to compete with swarms of political 
pamphlets, such as Swift wrote for the Tories, and 
Defoe for the Whigs, and with the wits of the clubs 
and coffee-houses, the proprietors found it no easy 
matter either to fill or to sell it. 

A few years later Addison's "Spectator" appeared, 
— a daily essay hitting off the follies and the foibles 
of the age, and regularly served at the breakfast-tables 
of people of fashion along with the tea and toast. 
Such was the humble beginning of that vast power 
represented to-day by the daily press of London. 



OF ENGLISH HISTORY. 149 



X. 



"The history of England is emphatically the history of progress. 
It is the history of a constant movement of the public mind, of a 
constant change in the institutions of a great society/' — Macaulay. 



-00>©<00- 



THE AMERICAN REVOLUTION. THE HOUSE OF COM- 
MONS THE PARAMOUNT POWER. THE ERA 
OF REFORM. 

LOSS ABROAD — GAIN AT HOME. 

The House of Hanover, 1714, to the Present Time. 

George L, 1714-1727. George IV., 1820-1830. 
George II., 1727-1760. William IV;, 1830-1837. 
George III., 1760-1820. Victoria, 1837 j£ 

George L, The Treaty of Utrecht was followed by 

1714-1727. a i on g period of prosperity in England. 
With the accession of George, the Whig party came 
into power, and the leaders of the Tories were im- 
peached for treason for having favored the fallen 
House of Stuart in the person of the eldest son of 
James II. 

The new king was George, Elector of Hanover, a 
German grandson of Elizabeth, only daughter of 
James I., of England, who had married the Elector 



150 THE LEADING FACTS 

Frederic, afterward king of Bohemia. He was a 
selfish, gross old man, who, in private life, would, as 
Lady Montague said, pass for an honest blockhead. 
He knew no English, and he made no effort to learn 
it ; but passed his clay quietly, smoking his German 
pipe, laughing at the caricature figures which the 
ladies of his court cut out of paper, and letting Sir 
Robert Walpole govern the country. 

Such a king suited an age represented by Ho- 
garth's pencil and Fielding's pen. The present form 
of government dates from this reign. In the time of 
William L, the knj|' himself appointed and dismissed 
his ministers. George I. was too ignorant of English 
ways, and too indolent to do this, and so the respon- 
sibility for the ministry devolved upon one of their 
number, who was henceforth called the Prime Min- 
ister Walpole first held that position as chief of 
the cabinet. In the next reign George II. com- 
plained that "in England the ministers are king." 

Fortunately the country was able to take care of 
itself. Voltaire said of the people, that they resem- 
bled a barrel of their own beer, froth at the top, 
dregs at the bottom, but sound and wholesome in the 
middle. It was this middle class whose solid good 
sense kept the nation right. 

In 1715, the son of James II., known as "the Old 
Pretender," to distinguish him from the king's grand- 



OF ENGLISH HISTORY. 151 

son, " the Young Pretender," 1 made an attempt to 
recover the three kingdoms, which, as the saying 
was, " his father had lost for a mass." He landed 
in Scotland and fought a battle at Sheriff-muir, 
which the old ballad in Scott's Heart of Midlothian 
describes : — 

" There's some say that we won, and some say that they won, 
And some say that none won at a', man ; 
But one thing is sure, that at Sheriff-muir 
A battle there was, which I saw, man." 

At Preston, the whole rebellion, which was not 
formidable, was crushed, and the Pretender escaped 
back to France. 2 

In 1719, a gigantic commercial enterprise organ- 
ized by the South Sea Company was started, which 
proposed to pay off the National Debt through the 
profits of the slave trade to be carried on between 
Africa and Brazil. The government approved the 
scheme, and the stock rapidly rose to a fabulous 
height. A speculative craze followed, the like of 
which has never since been known. Companies 
sprang into existence for objects as absurd as those 
ridiculed by Swift in his " Gulliver's Travels." One 
was for manufacturing butter from beech trees ; 

1 i.e., James Francis Edward Stuart, the "Old Pretender," and 
Charles Edward Stuart (his son), the "Young Pretender." 

2 See Sir Walter Scott's Tales of a Grandfather. 



152 THE LEADING FACTS 

another for teaching astrology ; a third had the 
audacity to issue a prospectus "for carrying on an 
undertaking of great advantage, but nobody to 
know what it is " ! Even this found subscribers for 
over two thousand "pounds sterling in a single morn- 
ing; when the ingenious originator, having secured 
the cash, forthwith disappeared. 

The narrow passage in which the offices of these 
companies were was crowded all day with eager 
speculators, so well depicted by Hogarth in his 
"Change Alley." In 1721, the bubble burst, and 
great numbers of people were hopelessly ruined. 

During this reign and the following, Walpole 
openly bribed members of Parliament, bought votes 
for government measures, carried elections by gifts 
of titles, honors, and bank notes, and proved to his 
own entire satisfaction his cynical maxim that 
" every man has his price." But bad as the policy 
was, it was yet a confession that Parliament ruled, 
and that not even the crown could carry a measure 
by force. Walpole was a fox, not a lion ; and foxes, 
as Emerson tells us, " are so cunning because they 
are not strong." 

George n., The second George was much like his 

1727-1760. f a ther, but he could speak English toler- 
ably. He was a good soldier, and, as Walpole said, 
" enjoyed knocking royal heads together on the con- 



OF ENGLISH HISTORY. 153 

tinent." There was war with Spain, war with 
France, war in India, war on the seas, and war in 
America ; and with such success that the prime 
minister complained that " he was tired of hearing 
of two great victories a week." 

No great principle was at stake in these wars, 
and most of them serve only to recall Southey's 
lines, in which the child asks, " What good came 
of it at last ? " 

Morally, the age of George II. seemed torpid with 
that torpor which precedes death. Intemperance 
was steadily on the increase. Strong drink had 
taken the place of beer, and the cry at every elec- 
tion was, " No gin, no king." The London taverns 
were thronged, day and night, and placards in the 
windows offered the tempting inducement, " Drunk 
for a penny ; dead drunk for twopence ; clean straw 
for nothing ! " On the straw lay men and women, 
helpless in beastly intoxication. 

Such was the state of things when, in 1730, 
a great religious revival began, which received, 
in derision, the name of Methodism. John Wes- 
ley, a student at Oxford, was its leader. The 
movement swept, with regenerating influence, over 
the whole country. Rough men, who had blas- 
phemed, and scoffed at church and Bible, were 
touched, and melted to tears of penitence, by the 



154 THE LEADING FACTS 

fervor of a man whom neither threats nor ridicule 
could turn aside from his one great purpose of 
saving souls. He did not ask the multitude to 
come to him : he went to them, preaching in the 
fields, at the corners of the streets, in the slums, 
on the docks, — in short, wherever he could find 
listening ears and willing hearts. No such ap- 
peals had been heard in England since the days 
when Augustine and his monks went forth on their 
mission among the barbarous Saxons ; and the re- 
sults answered fully to the zeal that awakened them. 
Better than all the boasted prosperity of the times, 
were the new life and the new spirit which then 
came into being, and by which the national church 
was " provoked to good works." 

In 1745, the Young Pretender, Charles Edward, 
came to Scotland, with seven followers, and with 
the aid of the Highland clans gained a victory at 
Preston-pans. At Culloden he was overtaken by 
the English army, and defeated with great slaughter. 
With the flight from that battle-field, the Jacobites 
lost hope ; there were no more ringing songs sung 
over bowls of steaming punch, like "Wha'U be king 
but Charlie ! " and " Over the water to Charlie ! " 
and when, soon after, he died in Rome, the Stuarts 
disappeared from history. 1 

1 See Sir Walter Scott's Tales of a Grandfather. 



OF ENGLISH HISTORY. * 155 

In 1757, the French made a desperate attempt 
to gain possession of India, but were defeated by 
Clive at the battle of Plassey, 1 and the English em- 
pire in India was established on a firm and lasting 
foundation. 

Two years later Canada was won from the French 
by Wolfe's victory at Quebec. Peace was made at 
Paris in 1763, Spain ceded Florida to England, and 
the English flag now waved over the whole eastern 
half of the continent, from the Atlantic to the Missis- 
sippi. A few more such conquests, and "her military 
drum-beat, following the sun and keeping company 
with the hours," would literally " circle the earth 
with one continuous strain of the martial airs of 
England." 2 

George ill,, ^ e was a man °^ excellent private char- 
1760-1820, acter, who prided himself on having been 
born an Englishman. Mentally he was conscientious, 
but narrow and stubborn to the last degree. " Be a 
king, George ; be a king ! " had been his mother's 
constant injunction ; and when he came to the throne 
George determined to be king if self-will would 
make him one. 

The wars of the two preceding reigns, together 
with the seven years' war with Spain, undertaken to 
prevent an alliance of that power with France, had 

1 See Macaulay's Essay on Lord Clive. 2 Daniel Webster. 



156 THE LEADING FACTS 

largely increased the national debt, and the govern- 
ment resolved to compel the American colonies to 
share the constantly increasing burden of taxation, 
The theory respecting the colonies, then held 
by England, had at least the merit of simplicity. 
They were looked upon as receptacles for the surplus 
population, bad or good, of the mother country ; as 
fields, too, wherein the favorites of the home govern- 
ment might make fortunes. By the Navigation Laws 
the colonies had to confine their trade to England 
alone. 1 They were expected to buy the products of 
her mills and factories and to supply her with raw 
material. They might not themselves make so much 
as a horseshoe-nail, or print a copy of the New Testa- 
ment, but they might and must submit to be taxed 
for the benefit of the benign power that conde- 
scended to rule over them. 

In accordance with this theory the ministry pro- 
posed various taxes on the American colonies, nomi- 
nally as compensation for protection afforded them 
against the French and the natives, or Indians. One 
form, and a specially obnoxious one, was that im- 
posed by the Stamp Act of 1765, which required all 
legal documents, wills, deeds, notes, drafts, receipts, 
etc., to be written upon paper bearing high-priced 
stamps. The leading men and the colonists gen- 
i See Section XII. 44. 



OF ENGLISH HISTORY. 157 

erally protested against this impost, and agents were 
sent to England and maintained there to sustain the 
protest by argument and remonstrance. 

The bill, however, was enacted by Parliament; 
the stamps were duly sent over, but the people re- 
fused them and much tumult ensued. In England 
strong sympathy with the colonies was expressed by 
such men as Lord Chatham, Burke, Fox, and, gen- 
erally, by what was well called " the brains of Parlia- 
ment." Chatham urged the immediate repeal of the 
bill, saying, "I rejoice that America has resisted." 

Since Magna Carta, the principle had been recog- 
nized that the king could not take the subject's 
money without the subject's consent. The Stamp 
Act was a clear violation of that principle, and 
Chatham declared that taxation of the colonies with- 
out representation was tyranny; that opposition to it 
was a duty ; and that the spirit shown by the Ameri- 
cans was the same that in England had withstood 
the Stuarts and refused illegal loans, "benevolences" 
and ship money. 1 

Against such opposition the ministry could not 
stand. The act was repealed, amid great rejoic- 
ings in London. Bow-bells were rung, and many 
ships in the Thames were illuminated. But the gov- 
ernment's pressing need of money continued, and 
1 See Chatham's Speeches on the Stamp Act, etc. 



158 THE LEADING FACTS 

another plan was adopted for getting it from the 
colonies. The half-bankrupt East India Company 
had heavy stocks of tea on hand, and it was agreed 
that in consideration of their shipping it to America 
the English duty should be remitted, and an impost 
of three pence per pound, payable by the colonists, 
should be levied. 1 By this arrangement the Ameri- 
cans would get their tea cheaper than before, but 
they were required to pay a tax on it, to which they 
had not consented. In itself the three-penny tax 
was a trifle, but underlying it was a principle which 
was no trifle. For such principles revolutions had 
been fought in the past and were to be again. 

The colonists had resolved on renewed resistance. 
When a shipment of tea arrived at Boston, it was 
seized by a band of men disguised as Indians, and 
thrown overboard. The news of that action made 
the king furious. The port of Boston was declared 
closed, and the charter of Massachusetts annulled. 
But even yet peace might have been restored if the 
counsels of the best men had been followed ; but 
George III. would not listen to compromise. His 
one idea of being king at all hazards had become a 
monomania. Fox wrote, " It is intolerable to think 
that it should be in the power of one blockhead to do 
so much mischief." The obstinacy of Charles I. had 

1 May's Constitutional History of England. 



OF ENGLISH HISTORY. 159 

cost him his head ; that of George the Third cost him 
the loss of the fairest and richest dominions he pos- 
sessed, after seven years of fighting, and an outlay of 
a hundred and twenty millions of pounds sterling. 

In 1775 war began, and the fighting at Lexington, 
and at Bunker-hill, showed that the Americans were 
in earnest. Then the ministry became alarmed. 
They were ready to grant everything but independ- 
ence, but it was too late. Washington, who was 
then commander-in-chief, declined to receive a letter 
from the English government addressed to him as 
George Washington, Esquire, and so negotiations 
were dropped. The war went on with varying for- 
tunes through seven heavy years, until the defeat of 
Lord Cornwallis at Yorktown convinced the king 
that he was throwing away life and money and get- 
ting nothing back. 

On a foggy November morning in 1783, the king 
entered the House of Lords, and with a voice betray- 
ing much emotion read a paper acknowledging the 
independence of the United States of America. He 
added a prayer that neither Great Britain nor 
America might suffer from the separation, and that 
religion, language, interest, and affection might 
prove an effectual bond of union between the two 
countries. 

Thus ended a contest which, as the Earl of Chat- 



160 THE LEADING FACTS 

ham declared, while it was in progress, "was con- 
ceived in injustice, nurtured in folly, and whose 
footsteps were marked with slaughter and devasta- 
tion." 

While the American war was in progress, Eng- 
land had not been wholly quiet at home. The 
Whig Party wished to repeal the severe laws against 
Roman Catholics ; but the feeling on the opposite 
side rose to such a pitch that in 1780 Lord George 
Gordon, a half-crazed fanatic excited an outbreak 
known as the No-Popery Riots, 1 which caused the 
burning of Newgate prison, the destruction of many 
innocent lives and much property. 

Still later Warren Hastings, governor-general of 
India, was impeached for maladministration, and was 
tried in Westminster Hall. Since Charles I. was 
arraigned at the bar of Parliament no case had 
occurred which excited the interest that this did. 
On the side of Hastings was the powerful East India 
Company, then the wealthiest corporation in the 
world, ruling over a territory larger than the whole 
eastern half of the United States from the Missis- 
sippi to the Atlantic. Against him were the three 
ablest and most eloquent men in England, — Burke, 
Sheridan, and Fox. The trial was continued at in- 
tervals for eight years, and resulted in the acquittal 
1 See Dickens's Barnaby Rudge. 



OF ENGLISH HISTORY. 161 

of the accused; but the mismanagement, cruelty and 
corruption that this protracted investigation revealed 
eventually broke up the gigantic monopoly, and India 
was thrown open to the trade of all nations. 1 

Another field of reform beside that in the East 
was found. The times were brutal. The pillory 2 
still stood in the centre of London, and if the offen- 
der who was put in it got off with a shower of mud 
and other unsavory missiles, instead of sticks and an 
occasional brickbat, he did well. On court days gen- 
tlemen of fashion arranged parties of pleasure to visit 
Bridewell to see the wretched women, who beat hemp 
there, whipped. The penal laws were equally savage, 
and inflicted capital punishment for a long list of of- 
ences, not less than two hundred in all, most of which 
would now be thought sufficiently punished by a few 
months' imprisonment. Women, and even children, 
were hanged for pilfering goods, or food, of the value 
of a few shillings. 3 The prisons were crowded with 
poor wretches whom want had driven to commit some 
trivial offence, and who were " worked off," as the 
phrase was, on the gallows every Monday morning, 
in batches of a dozen or twenty, in sight of noisy and 
drunken crowds who gathered to witness their death- 

1 See Macaulay's Essay on Warren Hastings. 

2 The pillory was not abolished until the accession of Victoria. 

3 Five shillings was the " hanging limit." 



162 THE LEADING FACTS 

agony. Through the efforts of Sir Samuel Romilly 
a reform was effected in this bloody code, and by the 
efforts of the philanthropist John Howard, and forty 
years later of Elizabeth Fry, the jails were purified 
of abuses which had made them veritable hells on 
earth. 

In 1789, the French Revolution broke out. On 
the execution of Louis XVI. and his queen Marie 
Antoinette in 1793, England joined the Bourbon alli- 
ance against France. 1 The close of the revolution 
brought Napoleon Buonaparte into power. Nelson 
fought the battle of the Nile, and later that of Tra- 
falgar, where 

" There was silence deep as death ; — 
And the boldest held his breath 
For a time." 

Trafalgar Square, in London, with its tall column 
bearing aloft a statue of the hero, commemorates 
the victory which was dearly bought with the life 
of the great admiral. 

Trafalgar snuffed out Napoleon's projected inva- 
sion of England. He had lost his ships, and their 
commander had committed suicide; so the French 
emperor could no longer hope to leap " the ditch," 
as he called the boisterous channel that lay between 

1 See Burke's Reflections on the French Revolution (Death of 
Marie Antoinette). 



OF ENGLISH HISTOKY. 163 

him and the power he hated. A few years pre- 
viously the union of Great Britain and Ireland had 
been consummated, and the parliament of the united 
kingdom was summoned. Pitt had urged that both 
Catholic and Protestant representatives from Ireland 
should be eligible ; but his advice was rejected, and 
though a majority of Irish people were zealous 
Romanists, not a single member of that faith could 
be elected. To increase, if possible, the Irish hatred 
of English misgovemment of their country, free 
trade with the English had, up to this time, been 
withheld from the Irish. They were thus treated 
as a foreign race, and as commercial as well as relig- 
ious aliens. 

In 1769, nine years after the accession of George 
III., James Watt had obtained his first patent for his 
steam engine. The story is told that he took a 
working model to show to the king, who patroniz- 
ingly asked, "What have you to sell, my man?" and 
was answered, " What kings covet, may it please 
your majesty, — power" The story is perhaps too 
good to be true, but the fact of the "power " could not 
be gainsaid — power, too, not simply mechanical, but 
moral and political as well. In 1811, such was the 
increase in machinery driven by steam, and such 
the improvements made by Hargreaves, Arkwright, 
Crompton and others in machinery for spinning and 



164 THE LEADING FACTS 

weaving, that much distress had arisen among the 
working classes. They saw their hand-labor sup- 
planted by " monsters of iron and fire " that never 
grew weary, that subsisted on water and coal, and 
that never struck for higher wages. Led by a man 
named Ludcl, the starving workmen attacked the 
mills, broke the machinery in pieces, and sometimes 
set fire to the buildings. The riots were suppressed 
by force of arms, and several of the leaders were exe- 
cuted. But a great change for the better was at 
hand. Steam soon remedied the evils that it had 
seemingly created. 

Until this period the north of England had been 
the poorest part of the country. The population 
was sparse, ignorant and unprosperous. It was in 
the south that improvements originated. In the 
reign of Henry VIII. the north fought against the 
dissolution of the monasteries; in Elizabeth's reign 
it resisted Protestantism; in that of George I. it 
sided with the Pretender. But steam wrought a 
great change. Factories were built, population in- 
creased, cities sprang up and wealth grew apace. 
Birmingham, Manchester, Leeds, Nottingham, Leices- 
ter, Sheffield and Liverpool made the north a new 
country. The saying is now current that "what 
Lancashire thinks to-day, England will think to-mor- 
row." So much for James Watt's " power " and its 
concomitants. . 



OF ENGLISH HISTORY. 165 

In 1812, the United States declared a second war 
against Great Britain. The English government 
had affirmed the principle that a person born on 
British soil could not transfer his allegiance to the 
United States; but that "once an Englishman 
always an Englishman " was the true doctrine. In 
accordance with that view they claimed the right to 
search American ships, and to take from them Brit- 
ish-born seamen. Thus they had seized more than 
six thousand men and forced them into their own 
navy, which was then needing sailors. 

During this war the British forces landed in 
Maryland, burned the capitol and other public 
buildings in Washington, and destroyed the Con- 
gressional library. The American navy had extra- 
ordinary and unexpected successes on the ocean and 
lakes. The contest closed with the signal defeat of 
the British forces at New Orleans, under Sir Edward 
Pakenham, brother-in-law of the Duke of Welling- 
ton, by the Americans under Gen. Andrew Jackson. 
The right of search was thenceforth relinquished. 

In 1814, a company was^ formed, after much 
opposition, for lighting London streets with gas. 
Till then the streets had been dark and dangerous 
by night, and highway robberies were frequent. 
The new light, as Miss Martineau has well said, did 
more to prevent crime than all the power of govern- 



166 THE LEADING FACTS 

merit had done since the days of Alfred. The sight 
now of the great city, viewed at night from the 
archway at High gate or from Westminster Bridge, 
brings to mind the lines, — 

"O gleaming lamps of London, that gem the city's crown, 

What fortunes lie within you, O lights of London town ! " 

****** 

" O cruel lamps of London, if tears your light could drown, 
Your victims' eyes would weep them,0 lights of London town ! " 

In 1808, Napoleon took possession of Spain, and 
placed his brother on the throne. The Spaniards 
appealed to England for help, and Sir Arthur 
Wellesley, better known later as the Duke of 
Wellington, was sent to their aid. With less than 
fort}" thousand troops he twice expelled the French 
from Portugal, once from Spain, and ended by 
carrying the war into France, and compelling 
Napoleon to restore the throne to Spain. 

On Sunday, June 18, 1815, the English war 
against Napoleon, which had been carried on at 
intervals since his accession to power, culminated 
in the -battle of Waterloo. All the previous night 
rain had been falling in torrents, and when the 
soldiers arose from their cheerless bivouac in the 
crushed and muddy fields of rye, a drizzling rain 
still fell. Napoleon hoped to destroy the allied army 
in detail, but Wellington held his own against the 



OF ENGLISH HISTORY. 167 

furious attacks of the French forces. As the day 
wore on, and he saw his squares melting away, as 
soldier after soldier silently stepped into the place 
of his fallen comrade, while the expected Prussian 
reinforcements still delayed their coming, the Eng- 
lish commander exclaimed, " O that night or 
Blucher would come ! " At last Bliicher did 
come, and as Grouchy, on whose aid Napoleon was 
counting, did not, Waterloo was won by the 
combined strength of the allies, and Napoleon's sun 
went down never to rise again. When all was 
over, Wellington said to Blucher, as he stood by 
him looking down upon the field covered with dead 
and dying, " A great victory is the saddest thing 
on earth, except a great defeat." 

In 1819, the first ocean steamship, an American 
vessel of about 300 tons,. the Savannah, crossed the 
Atlantic from the United States to Liverpool. Dr. 
Lardner, an English scientist, had proved to his 
own satisfaction that ocean steam navigation was 
impracticable. The book in which he demonstrated 
it was brought to America by the Savannah on 
her return voyage, and, twenty-one years later, the 
establishment of the Cunard and other great lines, 
one of which during a space of forty-five years has 
never lost a letter or a passenger, has shown conclu- 
sively that Providence is on the side of steam when 
steam has men that know how to handle it. 



168 THE LEADING FACTS 

In 1820 George III. died at the age of seventy- 
eight. During ten years he had been blind, deaf and 
insane. Once, in a lucid interval, he was found by 
the queen singing a hymn and playing an accompani- 
ment on the harpsichord. He then knelt and prayed 
aloud for her, for his family and for the nation ; and 
in closing, for himself, that it might please God to 
avert his heavy calamity, or grant him resignation 
to bear it. Then he burst into tears, and his reason 
again fled. In consequence of the incapacity of the 
king, his eldest son was appointed Prince Regent, 
and on the king's death he came to the throne. 
George IV., Was a dissolute spendthrift, who cared 
1820-1830. for little beside his own ignoble gratifica- 
tion, and used all his influence to retard measures 
of political reform. In 1785 he was illegally mar- 
ried to Mrs. Fitzherbert. Ten years later he married 
his cousin, the unfortunate Caroline of Brunswick. 
He separated from her in a twelvemonth. The first 
act of his reign was to exclude her name from the 
liturgy, and next to apply for a divorce on the 
ground of her unfaithfulness. No sufficient evidence 
was adduced against her, and the ministry declined 
to take action ; but it was decided that she could 
not claim the honors of coronation, to which as 
queen-consort she had a prescriptive, but not a 
judicial right. By advice of her counsel, she pre- 



OF ENGLISH HISTORY. 169 

sented herself at the entrance of Westminster 
abbey as the coronation ceremony was about to 
begin ; but admission was denied to her, and she 
retired to die, heart-broken, a few days after. 

In 1828 the Corporation and Test Acts were re- 
pealed. These had required of all military, civil 
and corporation officers subscription and conformity 
to the Church of England. At the same time the 
Catholic-Emancipation party demanded that Roman 
Catholics might sit as representatives in Parliament. 
The measure was finally carried in 1829. 

At about this time inventors were discussing 
plans for placing a steam-engine on wheels, and 
making it draw heavy loads. George Stephenson, 
who had made several experiments as early as 1814, 
succeeded at last it getting an Act of Parliament for 
constructing a railway between Liverpool and Man- 
chester. But when the road was completed it was 
with the greatest difficulty that he obtained leave 
to use an engine instead of horse-power thereon. 
Finally, his new locomotive, "The Rocket," 1 — 
which first employed the exhaust-steam to increase 
the draught of the fire, — was tried with entire 
success. In September, 1830, the line was opened, 
and the Duke of Wellington was one of the few 
passengers who ventured on the trial trip. 

1 " The Rocket " is preserved, together with Watt's first steam- 
engine, in the Patent Office Museum, London. 



170 THE LEADING FACTS 

On June 26, 1830, George IV. died. Of him it 
may well be said, though in a different sense from 
what Shakespeare intended, that " nothing in his 
life became him like the leaving it." 
William iv. Third son of George III. He had passed 
1830-1837. most of his life on shipboard, having been 
placed in the navy by his father when a mere lad. 
He came to the throne at the age of sixty-five. He 
was somewhat rough and overbearing in his man- 
ners, and he certainly had no aversion to low com- 
pany; but his faults were all on the surface. He 
was frank, straightforward, and generally liked; 
and was familiarly known as " the Sailor King." 

In 1882 the Reform Bill was carried by the king 
and Commons against the determined opposition of 
the Lords. Until this time the political representation 
of the country had been shamefully unequal and un- 
just. The borough of Old Sarum, for instance, still 
continued, as of old, to send two members to Parlia- 
ment for five hundred years after the place had 
ceased to have a single inhabitant ; another had for 
generations been covered by the sea, and still 
another was only a ruined wall in a gentleman's 
park. On the other hand, there were large towns, 
such as Birmingham, that had no representative. 

This singular state of affairs began in the custom 
of the king's assigning to such towns and boroughs 



OF ENGLISH HISTORY. 171 

as he chose to favor, the right of sending members 
to Parliament ; and these rights were retained un- 
changed, though the number of inhabitants had 
greatly diminished, while new towns had sprung up 
and increased, especially in the north and midland 
counties. 

As a general rule, these " rotten boroughs " were 
in the hands of the nobility, and large land-owners 
who were resolved not to give them up. Their op- 
ponents were equally determined. In a speech at 
Taunton, Rev. Sidney Smith compared the resistance 
to this reform by the Lords, to Mrs. Partington's 
effort to drive back the rising tide of the ocean with 
her mop. It rose, and she rose against it ; but after 
all the Atlantic got the best of it. So in this case, the 
people, like the Atlantic, carried the day. The 
"rotten boroughs" were swept away, and with them 
the disgraceful scenes formerly attendant on elections. 
To such an extent had corruption and violence been 
carried, that the smaller towns were sometimes under 
the control of drunken ruffians for several weeks. 
During that time they paraded the streets in bands, 
and assaulted voters of the opposite party with clubs, 
or kidnapped them, and perpetrated such outrages 
that voters often did not dare approach the polls. 

The House of Lords refused, during a long time, to 
assent to the Reform Bill and finally yielded only 



172 THE LEADING FACTS 

through fear that the king would create enough new 
peers to secure a majority for the measure. 

With its passage a great and beneficent change 
came. The landed interests no longer had absolute 
control of the elections ; but the commercial and 
manufacturing classes obtained a large influence 
which has since steadily increased. Political parties 
now assumed 'new names. The terms Whig and Tory 
were dropped : and Liberal and Conservative took 
their place. 

At the beginning of the reign of William IV. Eng- 
land had but one railway — the Liverpool and Man- 
chester ; but so rapid was the growth of this new 
mode of communication, that in five years London 
and the principal seaports were thus connected with 
all the great manufacturing towns, while steam navi- 
gation had nearly doubled its vessels and its tonnage. 

In 1833 Buxton, Wilberforce, Brougham and 
other philanthropists, against the strenuous opposi- 
tion of the king, secured the passage through Parlia- 
ment of a bill, for which they, with the younger Pitt, 
Clarkson and Zachary Macaulay had labored in vain 
for a half century, whereby all negro slaves in Brit- 
ish colonies, which now numbered eight hundred 
thousand, were set free, and twenty millions of 
pounds sterling were appropriated to compensate the 
owners. It was a grand deed grandly done, and 



OF ENGLISH HISTORY. 173 

America, had she followed the noble example, might 
thereby have saved a million of human lives and 
three thousand millions of dollars, which were cast 
into the gulf of civil war, while the corrupting in- 
fluence of five years of waste and discord would 
have been avoided. 

But negro slaves were not the only slaves in those 
days. There were white slaves as well, — women 
and children born in England, but condemned by 
their necessities to work under ground in the coal 
mines, or exhaust their strength in the cotton mills, 
driven by brutal masters who cared as little for 
the welfare of those under them as the overseer 
on a Southern plantation did for his gangs of toilers 
in the rice-swamps. Parliament at length turned its 
attention to these abuses and greatly alleviated 
them by the passage of acts, forbidding the em- 
ployment of women in the collieries, and of young 
children in the factories. In an overcrowded country 
like England, the lot of the poor must continue to 
be exceptionally hard, but there is no longer the in- 
difference toward it that once prevailed. Poverty 
there may still be a crime, but it is regarded now as 
a crime having extenuating circumstances. 
Victoria, Victoria, niece of William IV. and George 

1837 to the § & 

present time. Iv . In her veins flows the blood of Cer- 
dic the Saxon, and William the Conqueror, — a fact 



174 THE LEADING EACTS 

which strikingly illustrates the vitality of the heredi- 
tary principle in the history of the English Crown. 
A foreign race has invaded the island and seized the 
throne, the religion of Rome has given way to that 
of Luther, revolutions have come and gone, civil 
war has swept over the land, one king has been be- 
headed and another has fled, a republic has been 
established, new political parties have risen to power, 
Parliament has changed the succession and excluded 
the Stuarts, jet at the end of more than ten centu- 
ries we find England still governed by a descendant 
of her earliest rulers. 

At five o'clock on the morning of June 20, 1837, 
the Princess Alexandrina Victoria, a girl of eighteen, 
was roused from her sleep to receive the tidings that 
by the sudden death of her uncle, William IA r ., she 
had become queen of Great Britain and Ireland. 

At her accession a new order of things began. 
William IV. and the Georges had insisted on dis- 
missing their ministers when they pleased without 
giving any reason for the change. That system of 
" personal government " died with the late king. 
With Victoria, the principle was established that the 
sovereign cannot exercise the power of removal with- 
out the consent of the House of Commons, nor 
would the Crown now venture to retain a ministry 
which the Commons refused to support. 



OF ENGLISH HISTORY. 175 

In 1840 the queen married her cousin, Prince 
Albert of Saxe-Coburg, a duchy of central Ger- 
many. The Prince was about her own age, of fine 
personal appearance, and had just graduated at one 
of the German universities. He was particularly 
interested in Art and Education, and throughout 
his life used his influence to raise the standard of 
both. 

The same year Sir Rowland Hill introduced a uni- 
form system of cheap postage by which a letter 
could be sent for a penny to any part of the United 
Kingdom. Since then cheap newspapers, telegrams, 
and transportation by Parcel-Post have followed, — 
all improvements of immense practical benefit. 

The feeling attending the passage of the Reform 
Bill, near the close of the last reign, had passed 
away; but now a popular agitation began, which 
produced even greater excitement. A radical party 
called Chartists had arisen, who embodied their 
measures in the "People's Charter," which demanded 
universal suffrage, vote by ballot, annual parliaments 
with payment of members, the abolition of property 
qualification and the division of the country into 
equal electoral districts. 

While the country was discussing these proposi- 
tions, the government declared war against China, 
on account of the refusal of that country to admit 



176 THE LEADING FACTS 

opium from India. By a series of petty victories 
England succeeded in forcing the drug into the 
Chinese ports, and reaped a proportionate increase 
of revenue as the reward of her iniquity. 

In 1848 the French Revolution, which dethroned 
Louis Philippe, imparted* fresh impetus to the Chart- 
ist movement. The leader of it was an Irishman 
named Feargus O'Connor. He formed the plan of 
sending a monster petition to Parliament, containing, 
it was said, nearly six millions of signatures praying 
for the passage of the People's Charter. A pro- 
cession of a million of signers was to act as escort to 
the document. The government became alarmed 
at so formidable a demonstration, and forbade it on 
the ground that it was an attempt to coerce legisla- 
tion. In order that peace might be preserved, two 
hundred thousand special policemen were sworn in, 
among whom was Louis Napoleon, then a refugee 
in England. The Bank of England, the British 
Museum, the Houses of Parliament, and other public 
buildings were made ready to withstand a siege, 
and the Duke of Wellington took command of a 
large body of troops to defend the city. 

It was now the Chartists' turn to be frightened. 
When they assembled on Kennington Common, they 
numbered less than thirty thousand, the procession 
of a million dwindled to half a dozen, the huge peti- 



OF ENGLISH HISTORY. 177 

tion, when unrolled and examined, was found to 
contain only about one-third of the boasted number 
of names, and, on further examination, it was found 
that many of them were spurious, having been put 
down in jest, or copied from grave-stones and old 
directories. With that discovery, the whole move- 
ment collapsed, and the Commons, like the Homeric 
heavens, rang with " inextinguishable laughter " 
over the national scare. 

Still the demands of the Chartists had a solid 
substratum of good sense, which not even the blus- 
tering braggadocio of its leaders could wholly 
destroy. The reforms asked for in the petition have 
to a great extent been accomplished by the steady, 
quiet influence of reason and of time. 

The printed ballot has been substituted for the 
old method of viva-voce voting, the property qualifi- 
cation has been reduced to a point within the means 
of the poorest day-laborer, the right of suffrage 
has recently been so extended that it needs but one 
step more to make it universal, and before the cen- 
tury closes probably every man in England will 
have a voice in the elections. 

Up to this time protective duties existed in Eng- 
land on all imported breadstuff's and on many manu- 
factured articles. Sir Robert Peel, who became 
prime-minister five years after Victoria's accession, 



178 THE LEADING FACTS 

favored a reduction of the last class of duties, but 
believed it necessary to maintain the former. The 
result of this mistaken policy was great distress 
among workingmen, and the formation of an Anti- 
Corn Law League 1 by Richard Cobden and John 
Bright. Ebenezer Elliott, the Corn Law Rhymer, 
gave voice to the sufferings of the poor in rude but 
vigorous verse, which appealed to the feelings of 
thousands crying like him : — 

" England ! what for mine and me, 
What hath bread-tax done for thee? 

.jk. 4b £fc j£ A 

Cursed thy harvests, cursed thy land, 
Hunger-stung thy skill'd right hand." 

Still the government was not convinced of the need 
of change. At last the Irish famine opened the prem- 
ier's eyes. Through the failure of the potato crop for 
1845 and several successive years, the people of Ire- 
land were reduced to terrible destitution. As mat- 
ters grew w T orse, the starving peasants left their 
miserable huts, and streamed into the towns for relief 
only to die of hunger in the streets. Parliament 
responded nobly to the piteous calls for help, and 
voted no less than £10,000,000 for the purchase of 
food. America also sent ship-loads of provisions, yet, 
notwithstanding all efforts, upwards of two millions 

1 Corn is the generic name given in England to wheat, rye, bar- 
ley, and all grains used for bread. 



OF ENGLISH HISTORY. 179 

of people, or a quarter of the entire population of 
the island, perished. 1 In the face of such appalling 
facts, the prime-minister could hold out no longer, 
and the Corn Laws were repealed. 

The beginning once made, free trade in nearly 
everything except wine, spirits and tobacco, followed. 
These were, and still are, subject to duty, probably 
because the government felt as Napoleon did, that 
the vices have broad backs, and should carry the 
heaviest taxes. But, by a singular contrast, while 
nearly all goods now enter England free, yet Aus- 
tralia and several other colonies continue to impose 
duties on imports from the mother-country. 

In 1851 the great industrial exhibition, known as 
the World's Fair, was opened in Hyde Park, London. 
The original plan of it was conceived by Prince 
Albert, and it proved a complete success. For the 
first time in history the products and inventions of 
all nations were brought together under one roof 
in a gigantic structure of glass and iron, still pre- 
served at Sydenham. 

The same year the barbarous tax on light and 
air, known as the Window Tax, was repealed, and 
from this time the Englishman, whether in London 
or out, could enjoy his sunshine, — when he could 
get it, — without having to pay for it as a luxury. 

1 See McCarthy's History of Our Own Times. 



180 THE LEADING FACTS 

In 1853 Turkey declared war against Russia. 
The latter power had insisted on protecting all 
Christians in the Turkish Dominions against the 
oppression of the sultan. England and France con- 
sidered the czar's championship of the Christians as 
a mere pretext for occupying Turkish territory. To 
prevent this aggression they formed an alliance with 
the sultan, which resulted in the Russo-Turkish war, 
and ended by the taking of Sebastopol by the 
allied forces. Russia was obliged to retract her de- 
mands, and peace was declared in the spring of 1856. 

The following year was memorable for the out- 
break of the Sepoy rebellion in India. The real 
cause of the revolt was probably a long-smothered 
feeling of resentment on the part of the Sepoy, or 
native, troops against English rule, — a feeling that 
dates back to the extortion and misgovernment of 
Warren Hastings. The immediate cause of the up- 
rising was the introduction of an improved rifle 
using a greased cartridge, which had to be bitten off 
before being rammed down. To the Hindoo the 
fat of cattle or swine is an abomination, and his 
religion forbids his tasting it. An attempt on the 
part of the government to enforce the use of the 
new cartridge brought on a general mutiny. During 
the revolt the native troops perpetrated the most 
horrible atrocities on the English women and chil- 



OF ENGLISH HISTORY. 181 

dren who fell into their hands. When the insur- 
rection was finally quelled under Havelock and 
Campbell, the English soldiers retaliated by binding 
numbers of prisoners to the mouths of cannon and 
blowing them to shreds. At the close of the rebel- 
lion the government of India was wholly transferred 
to the crown, and in 1876 the queen received the 
title of Empress of India. 

In 1858 the first Atlantic cable was laid connect- 
ing England with America. Three years after that 
event, in whose celebration the queen took part, the 
prince consort suddenly died. Since then no court 
has been held, and so complete has been the queen's 
seclusion that in 1868 Sir Charles Dilke moved in 
Parliament that her majesty be invited to abdicate 
or choose a regent. The motion was indignantly 
rejected, but it revealed the feeling which exists, 
that " the real queen died with her husband, and 
that only her shadow remains." 

The period of the American civil war reflected 
little credit on the English government. At the 
commencement of hostilities the premier, Lord John 
Russell, utterly failed to understand the true nature 
of the struggle, and insisted that " the North was 
fighting for empire, and the South for indepen- 
dence," — a saying which would have applied with 
much greater truth to England in her relations to 
Ireland. 



182 THE LEADING FACTS 

In 1861 England and France recognized the Con- 
federate States as belligerents, thus placing them 
on the same footing as the loyal States of the North. 
Prince Albert, whose death occurred not long after 
the beginning of the war, John Stuart Mill, John 
Bright, and the starving weavers of Lancashire stood 
squarely by the Union, though the latter were suffer- 
ing terrible destitution from the stoppage of the 
mills from want of supplies of southern cotton. 
The majority of the distinguished political and 
social leaders, Lord Brougham, Carlyle, Ruskin, with 
the London Times, Punch, and other influential 
journals and the whole body of blockade-running 
manufacturers and merchants either openly sus- 
tained the South, or showed by their reticence that 
their sympathies were all on that side. 

Late in the autumn of that year Captain Wilkes of 
the United States Navy boarded the British mail 
steamer Trent, and seized the rebel commission- 
ers, Mason and Slidell, who were on their way to 
England. On the remonstrance of the English 
government, the commissioners were given up and 
an apology tendered by Secretary Seward. 

During the progress of the war, many fast-sailing 
vessels had been fitted out in England and employed 
in running the blockaded ports of the South, supply- 
ing them with goods and arms and ammunition. 



OF ENGLISH HISTORY. 183 

Later a gunboat named the Alabama was built on 
the Clyde and sold to the South for the purpose 
of attacking the commerce of the United States. 
Though notified of her true character, Lord Pal- 
merston, who was then in power, allowed her to leave 
port on the pretext that she was going for a trial 
trip. She set sail on her career of destruction, and 
after the close of the war the United States re- 
covered damages from England through an Inter- 
national Court of Arbitration, to the amount of 
£3,500,000. 

In 1867 the Electoral Reform Bill passed, confer- 
ring the right of suffrage on a large class of working 
men and other persons of moderate means, and 
recently a second bill has been passed, extending 
the same right much further. The next year an 
act for the abolition of compulsory church rates was 
carried. In 1870 a system of public schools was es- 
tablished under the direction of a government board, 
and hence commonly known as " Board Schools " to 
distinguish them from the National or Church 
schools. By this system, elementary education is 
made compulsory and is brought within the means 
of all. 

In 1871, under the ministry of Mr. Gladstone, the 
Irish branch of the Church of England was dises- 
tablished, thus placing all religious denominations 



184 THE LEADING FACTS 

in that country on a basis of equality, so that the 
Englishman residing there can no longer claim the 
privilege of worshiping Gocl at the expense of his 
Roman Catholic neighbors. 

But the Irish troubles are chronic, and one meas- 
ure of relief only brings another grievance into 
stronger light. Poverty and poor crops, with high 
rents, led finally to the formation of the Irish Land 
League which, failing to secure the reforms it 
demanded, determined to refuse to pay any rent 
whatever, and led to a wild outbreak of agrarian 
crime. Parliament now passed the Irish Land Bill 
to secure what was called the three F's, — Fair-rent, 
Fixity-of-tenure, and Freg-sale. The measure also 
provided that tenant farmers compelled by their 
landlords to vacate, should receive compensation for 
the improvements they had made. But experience 
has proved that additional legislation is necessary 
to make the measure of practical benefit to those it 
was intended to help. 

Within the past two years members of the Irish 
Fenian and Communist leagues have perpetrated a 
number of dynamite outrages in London with the 
view of intimidating the government. These das- 
tardly acts of indiscriminate destruction and murder 
are regarded with horror by that portion of the Irish 
people who have faith that the logic of events will 



OF ENGLISH HISTORY. 185 

eventually obtain home-government for themselves 
and their countrymen. 

But progress in England is not confined to politi- 
cal reform. During the past twenty-five years the 
systems of law and judicature have been recon- 
structed from base to summit, and the abuses which 
made Hume declare in debate, that the English 
Court of Chancery was " the greatest curse that ever 
fell on a nation," and which furnished Dickens with 
the materials for " Bleak House," have passed away. 

Immense improvements have been made in other di- 
rections. Free libraries, reading rooms, art galleries, 
are now open in all large cities. Sanitary regula- 
tions, with house-to-house inspection, have thrown 
new safeguards around human life. Hospitals and 
charitable institutions provide for the sick and 
suffering poor. Prison discipline has ceased to be 
the terrible thing it was when Charles Reade wrote 
" Never Too Late to Mend," and even the convict in 
his cell no longer feels that he is utterly outcast and 
friendless. The best men and best minds in Eng- 
land, without distinction of rank or class, are now 
laboring for the advancement of the nation, and with 
them the conviction constantly gains strength that 
the welfare of each depends on the welfare of all, 
and that the higher a man stands and the greater his 
privileges, so much the more he is bound to extend 
a helping hand to those less favored than himself. 



186 THE LEADING FACTS 

Yet in all the changes that are taking place, there 
is little if any disposition shown to break the bond 
of historic continuity which connects the England of 
to-day with the England of the past. "Do you 
think we shall ever have a second revolution?" was 
a question once asked of the Duke of Wellington. 
"We may," answered the great general; "but if we 
do, it will come by Act of Parliament." 

That reply well expresses the general temper of 
the people, who feel that theirs is 

" A land of settled government, 
A land of just and old renown : 
Where freedom broadens slowly down, 
From precedent to precedent." 

Here in America, we are sometimes in danger of 
losing sight of what those who have gone before 
have done for us. We forget that English history 
is in a very large degree our history, and that Eng- 
land is, as Hawthorne liked to call it, — " Our Old 
Home." 

In fact, if we go back less than three centuries, 
the record of America is blended and lost in that of 
the mother country that gave us Washington, 
Franklin, the Adamses, and John Harvard. Stand- 
ing on her soil surrounded with familiar names, we 
have a right to feel that all that she possesses 



OF ENGLISH HISTORY. 187 

is ours; that Westminster abbey belongs as much 
to us as to her, for our ancestors helped to build 
its walls and to raise its towers ; that Shakespeare 
and Milton belong to us also, for they wrote in 
the language we speak, for the instruction and 
delight of our fathers' fathers, who beat back the 
Spanish Armada, and gave their lives for liberty on 
the fields of Marston Moor and Naseby. 

Let it be granted that grave issues have arisen in 
the past to separate us, yet after all our interests 
and our sympathies, like our national histories, 
have more in common than they have apart. 
The progress of each country now reacts for 
good on the other. If we consider the total 
combined population of the United States and of 
the British Empire, we find that to-day upwards of 
ninety millions of people speak the English tongue. 
They hold possession of over twelve millions of 
square miles of territory — an area equal to the 
united continents of North America and Europe. 
By far the greater part of the wealth and power of 
the globe is theirs. In view of these facts let 
us say with Archdeacon Farrar, " Whatever there 
be between the nations to forget and forgive, is 
forgotten and forgiven. If the two peoples, which 
are one, be true to their duty, who can doubt that 
the destinies of the world are in their hands?" 



188 THE LEADING FACTS 



XI. 

THE PEERS, THE PEOPLE, AND THE GOVERNMENT. 

The English peerage originated in the Norman 
Conquest. William rewarded the chief men who 
accompanied him with immense estates granted to 
them on two conditions; one of military service, 
the other of their attendance at the king's council, 
a body which contained the germ of the present 
parliamentary system. It will be seen from this, 
that one of the most important features of the 
Conqueror's method of government was, that he 
made the possession of landed property directly de- 
pendent on the discharge of public duties. 

The conquest was simply the carrying out of that 
principle which Wordsworth has so well expressed, — 

" That they should take who have the power, 
And they should keep who can," — 

joined to the higher principle that in return for such 
taking and keeping the victors should consider them- 
selves responsible for the defence, and the good 
government of the state. The first barons 1 were 

1 The word barons, as here used, comprises bishops as well, who, 
with the two archbishops, constitute the "Lords Spiritual." The 



OF ENGLISH HISTOKY. 189 

probably about four hundred in number, 1 and they 
with the king, to whom they were strictly subordi- 
nate, held the whole country in their hands. As 
this body of nobles were all equal in their posi- 
tion, they constituted the peers 2 of the realm. 
Later, the king issued his writ to certain persons 
to attend Parliament, and the production of that 
writ constituted their right to sit there. These peers 
were called "barons by writ," to distinguish them 
from the barons by land tenure. The earliest of 
such writs are found in the reign of Henry III. But 
in 1387, Richard II. created one of the Beauchamps 
baron by letters patent, 3 and after that date many 
more were raised to the peerage in that way. 

present order of rank is Lords Spiritual and Lords Temporal. Of 
the latter, the order is now as follows : Dukes, Marquises, Earls, 
Viscounts, Barons, the last being the oldest, but to-day, the lowest title. 

1 The names of William's principal men are preserved in Domes- 
day Book and in the Boll of Battle Abbey ; but the latter was tam- 
pered with by the monks, and the list is of doubtful historical value. 
A similar list may be found inscribed on the western wall of the 
twelfth century church at Dives, Normandy, where the Conqueror 
built his ships and gathered his army for the expedition. 

2 Peers, i.e., pares, equals. The word first occurs in 1322, in an 
Act against the Despensers, and again in the Act of deposition of 
Richard II., "pares et proceres regni Angliae spirituales et tem- 
porales." 

3 i.e., an open letter, bearing the king's great seal, and ad- 
dressed by him to all his subjects, declaring the person named in it 
to be raised to the peerage. 



190 THE LEADING FACTS 

During the Wars of the Roses in the fifteenth cen- 
tury, the ancient nobility destroyed each other so 
utterly that as Lord Beaconsfield says in " Coningsby," 
"A Norman baron was almost as rare a being in Eng- 
land then as a wolf is now." At the present time the 
peers, with very few exceptions, do not date back 
farther than the Tudors. Henry VII. created many, 
endowing them with lands that had fallen to the 
crown through the extinction of the old families on 
the battle-field. Henry VIII. did the same by his 
favorites, giving them the confiscated property which 
had belonged to the monasteries. The greater part of 
those who now sit in the House of Lords are of com- 
paratively recent origin, and received their titles un- 
der George II. or III. oftentimes in return for services 
rendered the government. 

Politically speaking, the nobility of England, un- 
like the ancient noblesse of France, is confined to 
the male head of the family. None of the children 
of a duke or lord have during his life any civil or 
legal rights or privileges above that of the poorest 
and obscurest of her majesty's subjects. They are 
simply commoners. But by courtesy, the eldest son 
of a nobleman receives a part of his father's title, and 
at his father's death enters into possession of his 
estate, and takes his place in the House of Lords, 
having in most cases been a member of the Lower 



OF ENGLISH HISTORY. 191 

House by election for a number of years before. 
The younger sons inherit no hereditary title or 
landed property, and usually obtain offices in the 
civil-service, or positions in the Church or the 
array. 

The whole number of peers is about five hundred. 
Their average incomes are estimated at £22,000, or 
an aggregate of £11,000,000, an amount not greater, 
probably, than the combined incomes of five or six 
leading American capitalists. 

Some of these men have risen by dubious ways, 
and the bar-sinister ought by right to be the 
most prominent feature in their escutcheons ; but the 
great majority are gentlemen in the best sense of the 
word, and would do honor to any country and any 
age. Whatever be their faults as a class, they are 
not a close corporation, and they have seldom failed 
to give a hearty recognition to real merit. As every 
conscript in Napoleon's army carried a potential mar- 
shal's baton in his knapsack, and as every boy born 
in America feels himself a possible president, so 
every Englishman who has commanding ability may, 
like Pitt, Disraeli, Churchill, Nelson, Wellesley, 
Brougham and Macaulay, hope to win and wear a 
coronet. In fact, one of the most remarkable things 
about the peerage is the fact that it has constantly 
recruited its ranks from the body of the people, and 



192 THE LEADING FACTS 

that brains and character go to the front in England 
just as surely as they do here. 

Although the Peers in their legislative action have 
generally shown themselves ultra conservative, yet 
they realize that their interests are indissolubly 
bound up with those of the nation, and their caution 
and delay have often put a needed check on hasty 
and ill-considered legislation. 

They opposed the Habeas Corpus Act under 
Charles II., the great Reform Bill of 1832, and more 
recently the extension of the Franchise under the 
ministries of Lord Beaconsfield and Mr. Gladstone ; 
but, on the other hand, it was their influence that 
compelled John to grant the Great Charter, it was 
one of their number who called the House of Com- 
mons into being, and under the misgovernment of 
James II., it was the Lords as leaders, acting jointly 
with the Commons, who inaugurated that revo- 
lution which placed William and Mary on the 
throne, and finally established constitutional sover- 
eignty in place of arbitrary self-will. 

Socially, there are few idle rich men among the 
English aristocracy. On the contrary, many are as 
hard workers from a sense of duty and of honor, as 
any laborer who toils for his daily bread. England 
lays strong emphasis on nobility of rank and blood, 
but she is never forgetful of nobility of character. 



OF ENGLISH HISTORY. 193 

Perhaps it is the consciousness of this which has led 
men like Gladstone to repeatedly decline a title, 
content, as many of the descendants of the old Saxon 
families are, with the influence won by an unsullied 
name, and a long and illustrious career. 

THE RISE OF THE ENGLISH PEOPLE. 

When we first opened the history of England, we 
found, as we have seen, the country inhabited by bar- 
barous tribes of whose origin we know nothing. 

In many respects, their condition was but little su- 
perior to that of the American Indians, when Colum- 
bus discovered the New World. They had the 
equality which everywhere prevails among savages, 
where all are alike poor and alike ignorant. The 
unity that existed between them was something like 
that found among a pack of wolves, or a herd of 
buffalo, — it was instinctive rather than intelligent, 
and it was destitute of any marked traits of individ- 
uality or of independent choice. 

Gradually, and by steps which w^need not follow, 
these tribes learned to make tools and weapons, to 
cultivate the soil, and to build villages of huts, pro- 
tected by rude fortifications. Such was their condi- 
tion when Csesar invaded Britain. Under the 
Roman Conquest, the Britons made no real, per- 
manent improvement, and whatever they seemed to 



194 THE LEADING FACTS 

gain in arts and civilization was at the expense of 
their courage and their manhood. 

With the commencement of the Saxon period a 
change took place. The invaders from the conti- 
nent drove back the natives into the West and into 
the fastnesses of the Welsh hills. In certain sections 
they and their conquerors probably slowly mingled 
and became one people. 

Under the Saxons or English, we find that in time 
a regularly organized state was developed. The chief 
of a district like Wessex or Sussex eventually be- 
came king, and in the course of centuries one of these 
kings obtained the mastery over the whole country, 
and was acknowledged as its ruler. Society developed 
with the state. The king held a court composed 
of the earls or chief landholders, and his laws were 
made with their counsel and assent. Below these 
were the thanes, or those nobles who acted as 
attendants on the king, and who received estates 
from him for their services. Next came the churls 
or small freeholders and farmers, while last were the 
serfs who were attached to the soil, and the thralls, 
who were absolute slaves. The last two classes 
increased, and eventually constituted the majority 
of the population. 

The Norman Conquest brought a still further 
change. During the last part of the Saxon period 



OF ENGLISH HISTORY. 195 

the feudal system of land tenure had come into ex- 
istence. This consisted in holding land on condition 
of ■ rendering military or other service to a superior, 
who in turn held nominally from the king. William 
organized this system on a permanent basis, but 
eliminated the weak element from it by compelling 
every tenant, from the highest to the lowest, to ac- 
knowledge him as in very truth the real owner and 
ruler of every acre of the island. So completely 
was this carried out, that at last even the Saxon 
yeomen or small farmers were obliged to hold their 
farms on this condition. 

The most striking feature of the period was, that 
political liberty depended wholty on possession of the 
soil. The landless man had no recognized rights : so 
far as the state was concerned, his rank was simply 
zero. 

Under Norman rule the supreme power was vested 
in the king, who called to his council the great barons 
who resided on their manors, 1 surrounded by their ten- 
ants, the greater part of whom were serfs bound to 
the soil. The tendency under William and his suc- 

1 Manor, from Norman French memoir, a habitation. This was 
the name given by the Normans to the Saxon villages ; but as all the 
land in England was ultimately divided among the conquerors, or 
held subject to them, the word manor came to mean a baronial 
estate with its tenantry, part of whom would be freemen and part 
serfs. 



196 THE LEADING FACTS 

cessors was for the yeomen to decrease in numbers 
while the serfs gradually rose to the dignity of free 
tenants. 1 • 

Still, there was yet no English people ; that is, 
no great body of inhabitants united by common 
descent, by common interests, by pride of nation- 
ality and love of country. On the contrary, there 
were only classes separated by strongly marked 
lines. Those above spoke a different language 
from those below, and looked upon them with that 
contempt with which the victor naturally regards 
the vanquished, while those below returned the 
feeling with "sullen hate and fear.*' 

The rise of the people was very obscure and very 
gradual. It began in the rights secured to the lower 
classes in the conflicts between the barons and the 
crown; since in those conflicts the former believed it 
for their interest, to a certain extent, to form an alli- 
ance with their vassals ; next it sprang from the em- 
ployment of yeomen in the foreign wars, in which the 
barons found them an auxiliary of the greatest value ; 
and finally it came from the growth of free cities, that 
is, cities to which the king had granted certain privi- 

1 i.e., they became tenants by copyhold, that is, by certain condi- 
tions of service or rent, which were entered on the books of the 
court-roll of the lord of the manor, and of which the tenants held, 
or were supposed to hold, a copy. Disputes in regard to such mat- 
ters were tried in the court of the manor. 



OF ENGLISH HISTORY. 197 

leges, as in the case of Richard I., in return for the 
payment of a sum of money or the promise, made, 
or implied, of military support. 

Then in Magna Carta we find certain stipulations 
respecting the immunities and rights of freemen, 1 
which may perhaps be regarded as the entering 
wedge of the movement which slowly but surely put 
power into the hands of those who had never before 
held it. The next advance was in the establishment 
of the House of Commons, to which the inhabitants 
of towns sent representatives, thus securing a voice 
in the government of the kingdom. 

At first, Parliament had ho law-making but only a 
petitioning power ; the king still acted as legislator 
for the nation, though in all specially solemn acts the 
assent and co-operation of Parliament was sought, and 
it was agreed that Parliament alone could levy taxes 
and compel payment, — an agreement frequently 
violated by the king both in spirit and in letter. 
" Little by little the power of Parliament grew. The 
obsequious Parliament of Henry VII. and of VIII. 
became the murmuring Parliament of Mary, the 
grumbling Parliament of Elizabeth, and the re- 
bellious Parliament of Charles I." 2 Little by 
little the Commons, who at first hardly dared lift 

1 " Liber liomo, ,> Magna Carta, clause 39. 

2 Bagehot, The English Constitution. 



198 THE LEADING FACTS 

their eyes, still less their voices, in the presence of 
the haughty barons, began to exert their influence, 
and claim their rights as representatives of the peo- 
ple. Under James I. they secured the freedom of 
their own election, and immunity from arrest ; under 
Charles I. they extorted the consent of the king that 
they should not be dissolved without their consent. 

While these changes were taking place in the leg- 
islative body, others not less important were occur- 
ring in the structure of society. In the fourteenth 
century "Wat Tyler led the revolution against vil- 
lanage, and at the close of the next hundred and 
fifty years the farm laborer, who in most cases had 
been a slave chained to the soil, became free, working 
for wages, and selling his time, strength and skill, to 
the highest bidder. In the middle of the fifteenth 
century Cade and his followers rose in revolt against 
the abuses of elections on the part of the great land- 
owners, and obtained the reform they sought, which 
was that the representatives chosen to the Commons 
should be those whom the electors named. 

The Wars of the Roses, by destroying the power of 
the barons, and breaking up their estates, and the 
suppression of the monasteries by Henry VIII. , and 
the sale or gift of their lands to new possessors, 
had a tendency to enlarge the influence of the people 
still further. 



OF ENGLISH HISTORY. 199 

With the downfall of Charles I. and the establish- 
ment of the Commonwealth the people became the 
nominal rulers of England, although practically the 
country was governed by the army with Cromwell 
at its head. Still the victory of the Puritans or 
Roundheads over the Cavalier or Court party, marked 
the ascendency of the democratic, in distinction from 
the aristocratic, or class element. With the flight of 
James II., the passage of the Bill of Rights, and 
the Act of Settlement under William and Mary, the 
House of Commons in conjunction with the Lords 
declared themselves competent to fill the throne with- 
out regard to hereditary descent or " divine right." 

Under George I. a still further gain was made, 
since then arose the government of a ministry or 
cabinet who were held answerable in some degree 
to the Commons for the policy of the crown. 

Still the landed interest of England continued to 
be the real predominating power, as it had been 
throughout the middle ages. But with the inven- 
tion of the steam-engine and the improvements in 
manufacturing machinery, large towns grew up in 
the midlands and north, that claimed their share in 
legislation. This brought the Reform Bill of 1832, 
which took much of the power from the landholders 
and distributed it among the middle classes. 

With the accession of Victoria the principle was 



200 THE LEADING FACTS 

established that the ministry should be held directly- 
responsible to the House of Commons, and that they 
should not be appointed contrary to the wish, or be dis- 
missed without the consent of the House. By the 
Franchise Acts of 1867 and of 1884, the centre of po- 
litical gravity, as Lord Beaconsfield would say, 
shifted into the control of the working class, who 
now practically possess the balance of power as 
completely as they do in America. Thus, to-day, the 
people rule in England, or, in other words, the nation 
rules itself. It still continues, and perhaps always 
will, a monarchy in form, but it is a republic in fact. 

In feudal times and in the days of chivalry, the 
motto of knighthood was noblesse oblige, or, in other 
words, nobility of rank demands nobility of char- 
acter. To-day, the motto of the people should be, 
Liberty is Responsibility, for henceforth, both in 
England and in America, the people who govern 
are accountable if they fail to make use of their 
opportunities to govern well. 

The danger of the past lay in the tyranny of the 
minority ; the danger of the present lies in that of the 
majority. The great problem of our time is to 
learn how to reconcile the interests of each with the 
welfare of all. To do that, whether on an island or 
on a continent, whether in England or in America, is 
to build up the kingdom of justice and good-will 
upon the earth. 



OF ENGLISH HISTORY. 201 

THE ENGLISH GOVERNMENT. 

The English Government consists of three depart- 
ments : Executive, Legislative, and Judicial. 

The Executive Department is vested in an heredi- 
tary sovereign, who rules through a Ministry or 
Cabinet, composed as follows : — 

I. The Prime Minister. 

ii. The Lord Chancellor, 

in. The Lord of the Privy Seal. 

IV. The President of the Council, 

v. The Home Secretary. 

VI. The Foreign Secretary. 

vii. The Colonial Secretary. 

viii. The Indian Secretary. 

ix. The Secretary of War. 

x. The Chancellor of the Exchequer. 

xi. The First Lord of the Admiralty, 

xii. The President of the Board of Trade, 

xni. The President of the Poor Law Board, 

xiv. The Postmaster-General. 

xv. The Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster, 

xvi. The Chief Secretary for Ireland. 

The Cabinet is formed by the sovereign. The 
members constitute a standing committee of the 
Privy Council (a body of prominent men chosen by 
the crown as advisers). The Privy Council is 



202 THE LEADING FACTS 

summoned only on important occasions, but the 
Cabinet proper holds frequent sessions. 

The Cabinet exists by custom only, never having 
been recognized by any Act of Parliament, but the 
usage of the past hundred and fifty years has firmly 
established it as the real executive power. 

The Cabinet, usually called " The Government,*' 
is held responsible for all the acts of the Crown, the 
theory being that " the king can do no wrong," or, 
as Fox put it, that " the king reigns, but does not 
govern." "The Government" remains in power only 
so long as it is sustained by a majority of the House 
of Commons. Whenever the vote of the House is 
cast against any important measure proposed by the 
Ministry, it is accepted by the latter as expressing 
" a want of confidence in the Government " on the 
part of the people. 

Two courses are then open to the Ministry : they 
may resign at once (e.g., as in the case of the recent 
Gladstone Ministry), in which case the sovereign 
calls on the leader of the opposite party to form a 
new Ministry (e.g., such as the Marquis of Salisbury 
has just formed, at the request of the queen), or, 
if they do not think it expedient to resign, they 
may " appeal to the country," in which case the 
sovereign dissolves Parliament, and issues writs 
for a new election. Should the new House of Com- 



OF ENGLISH HISTORY. 203 

mons, returned by the country, be in sympathy with 
the Ministry, they remain in office ; if not, they 
promptly resign, and a new Ministry is formed from 
the opposite party. 

It follows from the above that inasmuch as the 
Ministry must, in order to continue in power, be in 
harmony with the House of Commons, which directly 
represents the people, therefore the English Execu- 
tive really reflects the popular will more closely 
and faithfully than the American Executive need 
necessarily do ; for a president, if untrue to the 
majority of the party which elected him, cannot be 
removed except by impeachment, while the English 
Executive, in the person of its prime minister (with 
his associates), can be compelled to resign at any 
time when his measures become obnoxious to the 
mass of the people. In fact, as Macaulay says, a 
sovereign who should now refuse to carry out 
(through* his ministers) the expressed will of the 
House of Commons would have to either fight or 
abdicate. 

The Legislative Department is vested in a Parlia- 
ment consisting of the House of Lords and the 
House of Commons. The House of Lords is com- 
posed of lords spiritual and lords temporal. 1 

1 i.e., the Spiritual Peers consist of the Archbishops of Canterbury 
and of York with twenty-four Bishops. The Temporal Peers con- 



204 THE LEADING FACTS 

The first, about thirty in number, are prelates of 
the Church of England. The number of lords tem- 
poral is unsettled, but is about five hundred; but 
there are sixteen Scottish peers and twenty-eight 
Irish, elected by the nobility, — the former for one 
year, the latter for life. The English peers are 
hereditary. The Lord Chancellor usually presides 
over the House of Lords. 

The House of Commons consists of about six hun- 
dred and fifty members, representing counties, cities, 
boroughs, and the two universities of Oxford and 
Cambridge. Of their number, fifty are Scotch and 
one hundred Irish. The members of the House of 
Commons are not elected for any specific time, but 
no Parliament can sit longer than seven years. The 
usual annual session is from January to July. The 
Speaker of the House presides over the Commons. 

No member of either House receives any salary or 
compensation for his services. No member of the 
House of Lords can be arrested for debt. 

All money bills must originate in the House of 
Commons. The Lords may reject, but cannot alter 
them. 

sist of five Princes of the Blood Eoyal, twenty-one Dukes, nineteen 
Marquises, one hundred and fifteen Earls, twenty-five Viscounts, 
two hundred and forty-eight Barons, twenty-eight Peers of Ireland 
and sixteen Peers of Scotland. 



OF ENGLISH HISTORY. 205 

Every bill must be read, and passed by a majority 
vote, three times in each House, and receive the 
royal signature before it can become a law. 

Although the sovereign has the right to withhold 
the royal signature, this right has not been exercised 
since the reign of Queen Anne. 

By its control of the public funds, and by its abil- 
ity through a ministry, necessarily in harmony with 
itself, to shape the entire policy of the government, 
the House of Commons is the actual ruling power of 
the United Kingdom. 

The Judicial Department consists in England and 
Ireland of the Courts of Chancery, Queen's Bench, 
Common Pleas and Exchequer ; in Scotland, of the 
Court of Sessions and High Court of Judiciary. 

In the rural districts courts are held twice a year 
by itinerant justices. The House of Lords is the 
highest law-court in the Empire. There are three 
kinds of law administered in England, — Common 
Law, based on custom or decision of courts ; Statute 
Law, which consists of Acts of Parliament; and lastly, 
Equity, administered by the Lord Chancellor, in 
cases not covered by Statute, and where justice can- 
not be secured by Common Law. 

The colonial possessions of England may be divided 
into two classes, — first, military and naval stations, 
such as Malta and Gibraltar in which the crown 



206 THE LEADING FACTS 

lias the entire control of the legislation (hence called 
Crown Colonies) ; second, colonies such as Canada, 
Australia, New Zealand, etc., which are governed 
by a constitutional and representative government, 
chiefly, or wholly, of their own choice, and in 
which the crown has only a limited power, as of 
veto on legislation, or the control of the public 
offices. In the Empire of India the executive 
authority is vested in a Governor-General appointed 
by the Queen (as Empress of India), and in a Coun- 
cil of State appointed by the Secretary of State for 
India, in London. 



OF ENGLISH HISTORY. 207 



XII. 

OUTLINE OF THE CONSTITUTIONAL AND POLITICAL 
HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

1. 878, Alfred. Treaty of Weclmore whereby 
Alfred ceded to the Danes all the country north 
of London, and of a line following the Roman 
road — Watling Street — from London, northwest, 
to Chester. 

2. 890, Alfred. Alfred, with the assent of his 
Council of Witan, or wise-men, published his Code of 
laws. 

3. 1050, Edward the Confessor. Edward the 
Confessor compiled a Code of laws. These have not 
been preserved. The code bearing his name is 
really of a later day. 

4. 1066, William the Conqueror. William the 
Conqueror granted a Charter to the city of London, 
guaranteeing to the citizens all their former rights 
and privileges. The original, which consists ' of a 
few lines of Anglo-Saxon, is preserved in Guildhall, 
London. The following is a translation : — 

"William, king, greets William, bishop, and Gos- 
forth, portreeve, 1 and all the burghers within Loii- 

1 Port-reeve, a high office corresponding, perhaps, to the modern 
mayoralty. 



208 THE LEADING FACTS 

don, French and English, friendly: — and I do you 
to wit that I will that ye be all law-worthy, 1 that 
were in King Edward's clay : — and I will that 
every child be his father's heir, 2 after his father's 
day : — and I will not endure that any man do any 
wrong to you. God keep you." [Here follows 
the king's mark.] See Taswell-Langmead's Const. 
Hist, of England. 

5. 1086, William the Conqueror. Domesday- 
book compiled. It is preserved in the Record-office, 
London; for full description of it, see Freeman's 
Norman Conquest. 

6. 1087, William the Conqueror. All the land- 
holders in England compelled to swear allegiance to 
the king at a great gemdt, or meeting, at Salisbury. 

7. 1100, Henry I. Charter of Henry I., of which 
this is the substance : (1) The Church to be free, i.e., 
to fill its own vacancies. (2) Feudal laws relating to 
property to be justly enforced. (3) The laws of 
Edward the Confessor to be retained, with William 
the Conqueror's improvements. The Latin text 
hereof may be found in Stubbs' Select Charters. 

1 Law-worthy, i.e., having the privilege of free men in the courts 
of justice. 

2 His father's heir ; under the feudal system, the children were 
not necessarily heirs to their father's estate. This was a special 
concession. 



OF ENGLISH HISTORY. 209 

8. 1136, Stephen. Stephen's Charter, which vir- 
tually repeated that of Henry I. 

9. 1164, Henry II. The Constitutions of Claren- 
don. These laws or decrees issued at Clarendon 
Park by Henry II. had for their chief object the 
abolition of the power of the clergy to try, in courts 
held by themselves, all offences committed b}^ any 
of their own number. Such were henceforth to be 
tried in the king's courts, unless referred by the 
justices thereof to the ecclesiastical courts. All 
appeals from the ecclesiastical courts must go to the 
king himself for final decision. In general, the pur- 
pose of these laws was to limit the jurisdiction of 
the Church and increase that of the civil powers. 

10. 1191, Richard I. First legal recognition of 
the corporation of London. It marked the triumph 
of the mercantile over the aristocratic or feudal 
element. 

u. 1213, John. Assembly of St. Albans. A 
united representation of townships. To this, the 
first representative assembly on record, says Prof. 
Stubbs, was submitted the first draft of the reform 
afterwards embodied in Magvia Carta. 

12. 1215, John. John compelled to sign Magna 
Carta. 1 The great charter consists of sixty-three 

1 Carta, this is the spelling in the Mediaeval Latin of the origi- 
nal and of all similar documents. Prof. Stubbs says that the whole 



210 THE LEADING FACTS 

articles. The original manuscript, in Latin, is pre- 
served in the British Museum. By its provisions, 
"1. The freedom of election to benefices was secured to 
the clergy. 2. The fines to the overlord on the succes- 
sion of vassals (or tenants) were regulated. 3. No AIDS 
OR SUBSIDIES ALLOWED TO BE LEVIED FROM THE 
SUBJECTS UNLESS IN A FEW SPECIAL CASES, WITH- 
OUT THE CONSENT OF THE GREAT COUNCIL. 4. The 
Croivn shall not seize the lands of a baron for a debt, 
while he has personal property sufficient to discharge 
it. 5. All the privileges granted by the King to his 
vassals shall be communicated by them to their inferior 
vassals. 6. One iceight and one measure shall be 
used throughout the kingdom. 7. All men shall pass 
from, and return to, the realm at their pleasure. 8. 
All cities and boroughs shall preserve their ancient 
liberties. 9. The estate of every freeman (freeholder) 
shall be regulated by his will, and if he die intestate, 
by the laic. 10. The King's Court shall be station- 
ary, and open to all. 11. Every freeman shall be 
fined only in proportion to his offence, and no fine 
shall be imposed to his utter ruin. 12. No peasant 
(freeman) 1 shall, by a fine, be deprived OF HIS 
instruments of husbandry. 13. No person shall 

Constitutional History of England is but a commentary on the 
Great Charter. 
1 " Liber Homo." 



OF ENGLISH HISTORY. 211 

be tried on suspicion alone, but on the evidence of 
lawful witnesses. 14. No free person shall be 

TRIED OR PUNISHED, BUT BY THE JUDGMENT OF HIS 
PEERS AND THE LAW OF THE LAND. John granted 

at the same time the Carta de Foresta, which 
abolished tliQ royal privilege of killing game all over 
the kingdom, and restored to the lawful proprietors 
their woods and forests, which they were now 
allowed to enclose and use at their pleasure." 1 

13. 1258, Henry III. Parliament chose a com- 
mittee of twenty-four to re-organize the govern- 
ment. The Provisions of Oxford were drawn up 
to reform grievances in Church and State. 

14. 1265, Henry III. A Parliament met to which 
were summoned two knights from each county, 
and for the first time representatives from cities and 
boroughs. This was the origin of the House of 
Commons. 

15. 1295, Edward I. The first complete Parlia- 
ment met, which consisted of the lords, the clergy, 
and the commons. In 1297 the king issued the Con- 
firmatio Cartarum confirming previous charters. In 
this reign the Statute of De Donis, i.e., Entail, was 
enacted, by which landed property was kept within 
the family in the line of the eldest son. The Statute 

1 For the Latin text of the Great Charter, with translation and 
commentary, see Taswell-Langmead's Const. History of England. 



212 THE LEADING FACTS 

of Quia Emptores, which shortly followed, had for its 
object the prevention of the alienation of lands. By 
these two statutes the system of real property may 
be said to have been firmly established. The Statute 
of Mortmain, also passed in this reign, may be con- 
sidered as the first property limitation directed 
against the power of the church. 

16. 1349, Edward III. First Statute of Laborers, 
which assumed to fix rates of wages, and forbade the 
giving of alms to sturdy beggars. 

17. 1351, Edward III. The Statute of Provisors, 1 
to prevent encroachment by the pope on the right of 
patrons to fill benefices or church-livings. 

18. 1353, Edward III. The Statute of Prae- 
munire 2 (so called from its initial word), the object 
of which was to prevent the pope's usurping jurisdic- 
tion, either by holding (through legates) courts in 
England, or by deciding on cases brought to him 
from England. . . . Cardinal Wolsey's offence was 
praemunire, and at a later date the whole body 
of the clergy were charged with the same crime. . . . 
In 1393 this statute was re-enacted in more stringent 
form, the pope of Rome being specially mentioned. 

19. 1401, Henry IV. First Act for punishing 

1 Provisors, from pro-videre, to look in advance ; hence, to ap- 
point to a benefice before it had become vacant. 

2 Prcemunire, this word corrupted from prcc-monere, to forewarn. 



OF ENGLISH HISTORY. 21 



Q 



heretics with death (de heretico comburendo), 
under which, in the same year, William Sautre, a 
Lollard, was burned. This was the first execution 
for heresy in England. In 1414 an additional 
statute against heresy was passed, and many Lol- 
lards suffered. 

20. 1534, Henry VIII. Parliament abolished the 
authority of the pope in England. The act affirms 
that "the bishop of Rome hath no greater juris- 
diction conferred on him by God in the kingdom 
of England, than any other foreign bishop." 

21. 1535, Henry VIII., by the Act of Supremacy, 
took upon himself the title, Supreme Head of the 
Church of England. In 1076 William I. had refused 
fealty to the pope, and had laid down certain strin- 
gent rules respecting the church. Later, however, 
the power of Rome re-asserted itself, and continued to 
increase until checked by the Statute of Mortmain 
under Edward I. [See No. 15.] When the Statute of 
Provisors was passed in 1343 [see No. 17], that, as 
Fuller quaintly says, drove the nail which the Statute 
of Prsemunire [see No. 18] clinched, and the claims 
of the pope, which began to go back slowly under 
the Statute of Provisors, went back swiftly under 
that of Prremunire, and fell down altogether under 
Henry VIII. 

22. 1539, Henry VIII. Act by which all monas- 



214 THE LEADING FACTS 

teries were dissolved ; their estates reverted to the 
king. 

23. 1539, Henry VIII. The Act of tjie Six Ar- 
ticles, which affirmed (1) the truth of the doctrine of 
Transubstantiation. (2) That communion of both 
kinds was not necessary. (3) That priests might 
not marry. (4) That vows of chastity ought to be 
observed. (5) That private masses ought to be 
continued. (6) That auricular confession must be 
retained. The penalty for denying the first was 
death ; for the rest, forfeiture of property for the 
first offence, for the second, death. 

24. 1549, Edward VI. First prayer-book issued, 
and Act of Uniformity of service passed. By these, 
Protestantism was virtually established. [See No. 
48.] 

25. 1554, Mary. All statutes against the pope, 
since the twentieth year of the reign of Henry 
VIIL, repealed. The forfeited monastic lands, 
however, to be retained by their then present 
owners. 

26. 1555, Mary. The statutes of Henry IV. and 
Henry V. against heretics revived. . . . Under these 
many Protestants died at the stake. [See No. 19.] 

27. 1559, Elizabeth. The Act of Supremacy 
(repealed by Mary) re-enacted. [See No. 21.] 

28. 1559, Elizabeth. The Act of Uniformity (re- 



OF ENGLISH HISTORY. 215 

pealed by Mary) re-enacted, and the prayer-book 
(suppressed by Mary) restored to use. 

29. 1563, Elizabeth. The Thirty-nine Articles, 
embodying the Creed of the Church, as still formally 
retained, drawn up and adopted. 

30. 1583, Elizabeth. The High-Commission Court 
established, whose function was to enforce the Acts 
of Supremacy and Uniformity. 

31. 1601, Elizabeth. First regular Poor Law 
passed. It compelled able-bodied paupers to work, 
and relieved the wants of those unable to work. 

32. 1628, Charles I. The PETITION OF 
RIGHT drawn up by Parliament, and reluctant- 
ly signed by the king. This provides (1) that no 
freeman be required to give any loan or "benevo- 
lence," gift or tax, without Act of Parliament re- 
quiring it. (2) That no freeman be imprisoned or 
detained contrary to the law of the land. (3) That 
soldiers or mariners be not billeted in private houses. 
(4) That commissions to punish soldiers and sailors, 
by martial law, be revoked, and no more issued. 
[For the full text of the Petition of Right, see 
Taswell-Langmead's Const. Hist, of England.] 

33. 1641, Charles I. Parliament passed the Tri- 
ennial Act, which required that a parliament be 
summoned every three years. This was repealed in 
1664, under Charles II. 



216 THE LEADING FACTS 

34. 1641, Charles I. The Grand Remonstrance 
drawn up by Parliament. It contained two hundred 
and six clauses relating the unconstitutional acts of 
the king, and demanded remedies. It was a vindi- 
cation of Parliament in its resistance to the king, 
and an appeal to the people. 

Parliament resolved that it would not be dis- 
solved except by its own consent. 

35. 1642, Charles I. Parliament sent nineteen 
propositions to the king at York, demanding certain 
reforms, which he rejected. 

36. 1643, Charles I. Parliament entered into an 
agreement with the Scots for assistance, and signed 
the Solemn League and Covenant. They united to 
oppose the projects of the king. 

37. 1647, Charles I. In this and the following 
year Parliament made many attempts to negotiate 
with the king, but in vain. 

38. 1648, Charles I. Col. Pride expelled the 
Presbyterian majority from the Houses of Parlia- 
ment. 

39. 1648, Charles I. The Independent minority 
of the Commons (fifty-three members) voted to 
bring the king to trial. . This being rejected by the 
House of Lords (twelve members), the Commons 
resolved that its enactments should have the force 
of law, without the consent of the king or of the 
lords. 



OF ENGLISH HISTORY. 217 

40. 1649, Charles I. The House"of Commons con- 
stituted itself a special High Court of Justice; tried 
the king, and sentenced him to be beheaded. 

41. 1649, The Commonwealth. The House of 
Lords abolished, as "useless and dangerous." 

42. 1649, The Commonwealth. The House of 
Commons resolved that government by a king or a 
single person is "unnecessary." 

43. 1649, The Commonwealth. The House of 
Commons declared England to be a Commonwealth 
and Free State. 

44. 1651, The Commonwealth. The House of 
Commons passed the Navigation Act (aimed at the 
Dutch), forbidding the importation of goods in 
any but English vessels or those of the country 
in which they are produced. [This act, with 
further restrictions, was afterward applied to the 
commerce of the American colonies, and was 
one of the causes of the American revolution.] It 
was modified in 1823, and repealed in 1849. 

45. 1653, The Commonwealth. The House of 
Commons, by an act entitled the Instrument of Gov- 
ernment, made Oliver Cromwell Lord Protector of 
Great Britain and Ireland. Hereby the executive 
power was vested in the Protector, and a Council of 
State of twenty-one members, chosen for life. The 
legislative power remained with Parliament. 



218 THE LEADING FACTS 

46. 1657, The Protectorate. Parliament offered 
the title of king to Cromwell, with a new Constitution 
explained in an instrument called the Humble Petition 
and Advice. This was a modification of the Instru- 
ment of Government. This he accepted, but at the 
request of the army, declined the title of king. 

47. 1660, Charles II. Military tenure of land, and 
feudal dues abolished ; and also the right of purvey- 
ance. [This was a monopoly for purchasing goods, 
etc., for the sovereign, at an appraised value, whether 
with or without the consent of the owner.] Feudal- 
ism had been dying out during two centuries; this 
Act formally ended it. 

48. 1661, Charles II. The Corporation Act passed, 
requiring all holders of municipal office to renounce 
the covenant and take the sacrament, according to 
the Church of England. [This Act repealed in 
1828.] 

49. 1662, Charles II. The Licensing Act passed, 
whereby the entire control of printing was vested in 
the government. Printing might be done at four 
places only, viz. : London, York, the Universities of 
Oxford and Cambridge. The number of master prin- 
ters was limited to twenty. The Secretary of State 
was empowered to issue warrants for discovering 
and seizing libels against the government. [It was 
against this Act that Milton wrote his Areopagitica, 



OF ENGLISH HISTORY. 219 

or plea for unlicensed printing. This Act was re- 
newed from time to time, until 1695.] See chapter 
on the Rise of Freedom of the Press, in Taswell- 
Langmead's Constitutional History of England. 

50. 1662, Charles II. The Act of Uniformity re- 
enacted, enforcing the use of the prayer-book, which 
had been suppressed during the Commonwealth. 
[Two thousand ministers resigned their livings 
rather than take oath to observe this Act.] 

51. 1664, Charles II. The Triennial Bill repealed. 
[See Nos. 33 and 6Q.] 

52. 1664, Charles II. The Conventicle Bill passed, 
forbidding religious assemblies other than of the 
Church of England. [Under this Act, John Bunyan 
and many others were imprisoned.] 

53. 1665, Charles II. The Five Mile Act passed, 
forbidding ministers who had not subscribed the 
Act of Uniformity [see No. 48], or taken the 
oath of non-resistance (i.e., to the king), to teach in 
schools, or to settle within five miles of any corporate 
town. 

54. 1672, Charles II. The Declaration of Indul- 
gence passed, repealing all Acts against Non-conform- 
ists and Roman Catholics. 

55. 1673, Charles II. The Test Act passed, requir- 
ing all persons holding office under the crown to take 
the sacrament according to the Church of England, 



220 THE LEADING FACTS 

and disclaim belief in transubstantiation. [Repealed 
in 1828.] 

56. 1678, Charles II. Act passed disabling Papists 
from sitting in either House of Parliament (the Duke 
of York, a Roman Catholic, alone excepted). 

57. 1679, Charles II. Habeas Corpus Act passed, 
requiring that any person, imprisoned for any crime, 
shall, before trial or conviction, be brought before a 
judge who shall enquire why he is detained. The 
object hereof is protection against unlawful imprison- 
ment. [This Act was new in form only. 1 ] 

58. 1687, James II. A Second Declaration of In- 
dulgence passed [see No. 54], suspending the penal 
statutes against Roman Catholic and Protestant 
Dissenters, — the design being to favor Romanism. 
[The attempt to enforce this Act brought on a crisis, 
and caused the king to leave the throne and the 
country.] 

59. 1688, James II. William of Orange issued 
his Declaration recounting James's illegal acts, and 
declaring that, as the husband of Mary, he was 
coming with an army to secure a free and legal par- 
liament, by whose decision he would abide. 

60. 1688, The Interregnum. James having fled, 
the Convention Parliament (so-called because con- 

1 The substance of it being included in Magna Carta. See Sir 
James Mackintosh. 



OF ENGLISH HISTORY. 221 

vened without being formally elected) met and drew 
up the Declaration of Rights, which settled the throne 
on William and Mary, — the executive power vested 
with William, — and these having accepted the Decla- 
ration, were proclaimed sovereigns on Feb. 13, 1689. 

61. 1689, William and Mary. A new Oath of Al- 
legiance and Supremacy imposed on all officials in 
Church or State. Seven bishops and about three 
hundred clergy refuse to take it and form a body of 
Non-jurors. 

62. 1689, William and Mary. The Mutiny Bill 
passed, whereby England is effectually protected 
against a standing army, since no pay can be issued 
to troops, and no punishment can be inflicted for 
mutiny, unless authorized by the annual re-enact- 
ment of the bill. 

63. 1689, William and Mary. The Toleration 
Act passed, repealing penalties against Non-conform- 
ists in religion. 

64. 1689, William and Mary. The BILL OF 
RIGHTS [see No. 60] enacted by Parliament. 1 This 
bill provides that, (1) the pretended power of the 
crown of suspending or dispensing with the law is 
illegal. (2) The late court of ecclesiastical commis- 
sion, and all such courts, are illegal. (3) The levy- 
ing of money under pretense of prerogative, without 

1 This Bill embodied the Declaration of Rights. See No. 60. 



222 THE LEADING FACTS 

grant of Parliament, is- illegal. (4) Keeping a 
standing army in time of peace, without consent 
of Parliament, is illegal. (5) Subjects have a right 
to petition the king. (6) The election of members 
of Parliament ought to be free. (7) Freedom of 
speech and debate in Parliament ought not to be 
questioned in any court or place out of Parliament. 

(8) Excessive fines must not be imposed, and jurors, 
in cases of high treason, must be free-holders. 

(9) For redress of all grievances and for the 
strengthening of the laws, parliaments ought to be 
held frequently. (10) William and Mary are de- 
clared king and queen of England, and all who are 
Papists, or who shall marry a Papist, are declared in- 
capable of possessing the crown [see No. 70]. Thus 
Magna Caeta (No. 12), the Petition of Right 
(No. 32), and the Bill of Rights, constituting, as 
they do, the only written Constitution that England 
possesses, are, in the words of Lord Chatham, THE 
BIBLE OF HER POLITICAL LIBERTIES. 

65. 1694, William and Mary. The Governor and 
Company of the Bank of England were incorpor- 
ated by royal charter, being an association of capital- 
ists making a loan to government of one million two 
hundred thousand pounds sterling. 

66. 1694, William and Alary. The Triennial Act 
restored. [See No. 51.] 



OF ENGLISH HISTORY. 223 

67. 1695, William and Mary. The House of 
Commons refuses to renew the Licensing Act [see 
No. 49], thus establishing the Freedom of the 
Pkess. 

68. 1696, William and Mary. Act regulating 
Trials for Treason passed, which provides that the 
accused shall receive, several days before trial, a 
copy of the indictment, and also a list of the jury ; 
and that the witnesses be examined on oath ; and 
that at least two witnesses are needful to prove an 
overt act. This act inaugurated an important re- 
form in political trials. 

69. 1700, William and Mary. A severe Act 
against Roman Catholics passed, imposing the pen- 
alty of imprisonment for life against any priest who 
exercises his functions in England ; requiring every 
papist, at the age of eighteen, to take the oath of 
allegiance and supremacy, and subscribe the declara- 
tion against transubstantiation [see No. 5b], etc., in 
default of which he is declared incapable of holding 
land by purchase or inheritance, and his property is 
to go to his next Protestant kin. No Roman Catho- 
lic may send his children abroad to be educated. 

[This stringent act was seldom enforced, and was 
repealed in 1778. See No. 78.] 

70. 1701, William and Mary. The Act of Settle- 
ment passed, whereby, on the death of Anne, the 



224 THE LEADING FACTS 

crown is to pass to the Electress Sophia of Hanover 
and her Protestant descendants [see Descent of Eng- 
lish Sovereigns, George I., also No. 64, section 10]. 

[For full text of this Act, see Taswell-Langmead's 
Const. Hist, of England.] . 

71. 1707, Anne. Bill for the Union of Eng- 
land and Scotland passed, the title of the united 
kingdom to be Great Britain; Scotland to be 
represented in Parliament by forty-five members 
of the Commons, and in the House of Lords by six^ 
teen of the peers of Scotland, chosen at each general 
election. 

72. 1711, Anne. An Act against Occasional Con- 
formity passed, whereby any civil or military officer 
or any magistrate of a corporation who, having 
received the sacrament according to the Test Act of 
Charles II. [see No. 55], should, during his term of 
office, attend any conventicle or dissenting meeting, 
shonld forfeit forty pounds sterling, and be incapable 
of holding any office or employment under govern- 
ment. [This Act repealed in 1718.] 

73. 1716, George I. The Septennial Act passed, 
extending duration of Parliament to seven years. 

74. 1720, George I. The South Sea Company, 
which had been incorporated in 1711 to trade in the 
South Seas, purchased part of the National Debt. 
A period of wild speculation followed which led 
to much distress, failure and ruin. 



OF ENGLISH HISTORY. 225 

75. 1751, George II. The New Style adopted 
in the calendar, whereby the year is made to begin 
on the 1st day of January, instead of March 
25th as before, and in the year 1752, eleven days, 
between the second and fourteenth days of Septem- 
ber, were suppressed. 

76. 1765, George III. The Stamp Act for 
America passed during Grenville's ministry, against 
the protest of six colonies. This act required all 
contracts, wills and other legal instruments to 
bear a stamp affixed by government for prescribed 
charge paid. [For a full account hereof, fac-simile 
of stamp, etc., see Lossing's Field-book of the Revo- 
lution, Vol. II., appendix.] 

[The Act was repealed in 1766.] 

77. 1772, George III. The Royal Marriage Act 
passed, which forbade the marriage of any descend- 
ant of George II, without the consent of the reign- 
ing sovereign; unless said descendant be fully 
twenty-five years of age, and has given to the 
Privy Council twelve months' notice of intention of 
marriage, and the same has not been petitioned 
against by Parliament. 

[The Prince of Wales, afterwards George IV., 
violated this law by marrying Mrs. Fitzherbert, a 
Roman Catholic] 

78. 1778, George III. Roman Catholic Relief 



226 THE LEADING FACTS 

Bill passed, repealing the stringent Act of 1700. 
[See No. 69.] 

79. 1779, George III. An Act passed relieving 
dissenting ministers and schoolmasters from subjec- 
tion to the Thirty-Nine articles. 

80. 1780, George III. An Act passed annulling 
many restrictions previously existing on trade ivith 
Ireland. 

81. 1783, George III. Recognition of the Inde- 
pendence of the United States of America. 

82. 1784, George III. An Act placing the govern- 
ment of India under a Board of Control in England. 
[Its affairs had previously been managed by the 
East India Company.] 

83. 1800, George III. The Act for the Union of 
Great Britain and Ireland, establishing free trade 
between them, and giving Ireland representation in 
Parliament by four bishops, twenty-eight peers, and 
one hundred commoners. 

84. 1807, George III. The Government Orders in 
Council prohibit all trade with French ports. [This 
Act was in retaliation for Napoleon's Berlin decrees, 
which declared the British Isles in a state of 
blockade.] 

85. 1807, George III. The Act abolishing the 
Slave Trade passed. 

86. 1811, George III. The Begency Bill passed, 



OF ENGLISH HISTORY. 227 

making the Prince of Wales regent, on account of 
the renewed attack of insanity of the king. [He 
became king on the decease of his father, George 
III., in 1820.] 

87. 1812. The Regency. An Act for the fur- 
ther Relief of Dissenters passed. 

88. 1819, The Regency. An Act called The Six 
Acts passed, relating to delays in the administration 
of justice, to seditious libels, the seizure of arms, etc. 

89. 1829, George IV. The Roman Catholic Re- 
lief Bill passed, admitting Roman Catholics to Par- 
liament, by new form of oath, and to nearly all civil 
and political offices. 

90. 1829, George IV. The property qualification 
of voters in Ireland raised from forty shillings to ten 
pounds. 

91. 1832, William IV. The Reform Bill passed 
whereby many " rotten boroughs " were disfran- 
chised and representation in Parliament granted 
to Manchester, Leeds, Birmingham, by two members 
each, and to nineteen other large towns ; also ex- 
tending the franchise to many small free-holders and 
tenants-at-will. [Before this, several places entirely 
without population had sent members to Parliament, 
while Birmingham and many other large towns had 
been unrepresented.] 

92. 1833, William IV. The Act for the Emanci- 



228 THE LEADING FACTS 

Ration of Slaves in the British West Indies passed, 
and twenty millions of pounds sterling appropriated 
to compensate owners. [Hereby slavery throughout 
the British Empire ceased to exist August 1, 1834.] 

93. 1834, William IV. The Poor Law Amend- 
ment Act passed, whereby parishes are joined in 
" Unions," with union work-houses ; and out-door 
relief to the able-bodied is forbidden. [Previous 
hereto, the poor-rates, i.e., taxes for support of pau- 
pers, had reached the enormous amount of eight 
million six hundred thousand pounds, and in many 
places equalled or exceeded the annual rent of the 
land.] 

94. 1836, William IV. Bill for Commutation of 
Church-tithes passed, whereby church dues were made 
payable at a fixed rate in money, instead of tithes of 
grain, and other products of the farm. 

95. 1837, Victoria. Criminal Law Reform 
enacted, whereby the pillory was abolished, and 
capital punishment for many crimes ceased. [So 
lately as the reign of George IV. capital punish- 
ment was inflicted for nearly two hundred several 
offences ; and the starving wretch who stole a sack 
of flour was hanged side-by-side with highwaymen 
and murderers.] 

96. 1839, Victoria. Penny postage established. 

97. 1839, Victoria. The Education Grant increased. 



OF ENGLISH HISTORY. 229 

98. 1846, Victoria. Abolition of the Corn Laws. 
[Previous to 1436 the exportation of corn (i.e., grain, 
bread-stuffs) was forbidden. In 1463 its importa- 
tion, except in some special cases, was forbidden. 
The laws were frequently changed, but often bad 
harvests caused lack of food, and distress resulted. 
At last, more than four centuries after the passage 
of the first law the great famine in Ireland compelled 
the ministry to propose the abolition of all duties on 
imported bread-stuffs.] 

99. 1855, Victoria. Repeal of the Newspaper Tax. 
From this resulted rapid and great increase of cheap 
newspapers throughout the land, especially in Lon- 
don. 

100. 1858, Victoria. Abolition of the Property 
Qualification for members of Parliament from England 
and Ireland. 

101. 1859, Victoria. Act for admitting Jews to 
sit in Parliament passed. 

102. 1861, Victoria. Imprisonment of common 
debtors abolished. 

103. 1867, Victoria. New Reform Bill passed, 
which largely extended the franchise. [See No. 
114.] 

104. 1868, Victoria. Compulsory Church-rates 
abolished. 

105, 1869, Victoria. Act Disestablishing the Irish 



230 THE LEADING FACTS 

Branch of the Church of England passed, whereby 
the Catholics of Ireland are relieved of all contri- 
bution to the support of the Church of England, which 
(in Ireland) now depends on voluntary contribution. 

106. 1870, Victoria. Government, or Board-Schools 
established. They are so termed because governed 
by a Board appointed by government. Elementary 
education is made compulsory, and brought within 
the means of all. 

107. 1870, Victoria. Irish Land Act passed, 
whereby compensation is secured to the tenant for 
improvements made by him, and also for disturbance 
by act of the landlord, except in cases of eviction for 
non-payment of rent. 

108. 1871, Victoria. Abolition of Religious Tests 
at the Universities of Oxford and Cambridge. The 
honors and privileges of these time-honored seats of 
learning, formerly withheld from those who would 
not sign prescribed articles of belief, are henceforth 
open to all duly qualified applicants. 

109. 1872. Victoria. The Geneva Tribunal awards 
£ 3,500,000 as damages due from England to the 
United States for the escape of the Alabama and 
other vessels employed by the Confederate States 
during the Civil War. This decision, says the Lon- 
don Times, establishes the principle that "neutrals 
are to be held responsible for negligence in allowing 



OF ENGLISH HISTORY. 231 

vessels to be built or equipped in their dominions 
for purposes of hostility to a belligerent." 

110. 1881, Victoria. Second Irish Land Act, 
(known as "the three F's," viz.: "Fair Rent," 
" Fixity of Tenure," and " Free Sale ") passed, 
which provides, first, that a tenant may sell his in- 
terest to the highest bidder, and that the purchaser 
shall acquire all the seller's rights, as a present 
tenant; and, secondly, that the present tenant, or 
his assignee, may apply to a court to fix a judicial 
rent, subject to statute, for the term of fifteen years, 
during which time the tenant may not be disturbed, 
except through his own act. At the end of said 
term, the tenant may apply for renewal. 

ill. 1882, Victoria. Bill passed to facilitate free 
trade in land. 

112. 1882, Victoria. The Crimes Act passed to 
repress outrages committed by the Irish Land 
League. 

113. 1884, Victoria. The Corrupt Practices Act 
passed to punish bribery at elections, etc. 

114. 1884, Victoria. The Franchise Bill passed. 
By this measure the borough franchise of 1867 [see 
No. 103] is extended to the counties. It particularly 
benefits the agricultural laborers, and others of small 
means living in the country, who have not hitherto 
had the suffrage. 



232 ENGLISH HISTORY. 

115. 1885, Victoria. The Franchise Act took 
effect this year, and over 1,300,000 new voters were 
admitted to the polls in England. The total number 
of voters in the United Kingdom is now estimated at 
about 6,300,000. 



STATISTICS. 



I. England and Wales. Extreme length (i.e., 

from Land's End to Berwick-on-Tweed) . 365 miles. 
England and Wales. Extreme breadth (i.e., 
from Land's End to the easternmost part 
of Kent), about 311 miles. 

In general it may be said that no part of the country 
is more than 100 miles distant from the sea. 

Area 58,310 sq. miles. 

Population (official estimate for 1884) . . 27,132,449 
Population to square mile, about . . . 465 
Average increase of population for last de- 
cade, about 13 per cent. 

II. Area of the United Kingdom of Great Britain 

and Ireland .... 121,115 sq. miles. 

Population of the United Kingdom of Great 

Britain and Ireland 36,300,000 

III. Area of the British Empire (Whitaker for 

1885) 1 8,990,211 sq. miles. 

Population of the British Empire (Whitaker 

for 1885) 310,225,000 

The area embraces considerably more than one-sixth 
of the land-surface of the globe, and the population com- 
prises nearly one-fifth of the total population of the 
world. 

IV. Population of the principal cities and towns 

of England and Wales (official estimate 
for 1884): — 

1 i.e., Whitaker's Almanack, 1885. 



234 



STATISTICS. 



V. 



VI. 



10. 

11. 



1. London 

2. Liverpool (with Birkenhead, 90,870) 

3. Manchester (with Salford, 197,153) 

4. Birmingham 

5. Leeds . 

6. Sheffield . 

7. Bristol 

8. Bradford . 

9. Nottingham 
Hull . 
Newcastle . 

12. Portsmouth 

13. Leicester . 

14. Sunderland 

15. Oldham 

16. Brighton . 

17. Blackburn 

18. Preston 

19. Cardiff (Wales) 

20. Norwich . 

21. Derby 

22. Huddersfield 

23. Wolverhampton 

24. Halifax . 

25. Plymouth . 

1. Glasgow (Scotland) 

2. Edinburgh (Scotland) 

3. Dublin (Ireland) 

One-fourth of the entir 

of England and Wales is in London, 
and about one-third in eighteen other large 
cities. The average annual growth of the 
principal cities is a little over . 

In its comparative size London equals the united 
populations of the following American cities: New 
York, Philadelphia, Chicago, Baltimore, St. Louis, Bos- 
ton, and San Francisco, and its present yearly increase 
is over 60,000. 



e urban population 



4,019,361 

664,072 

535,449 

421,258 

327,324 

300,569 

215,547 

209,564 

205,298 

181,225 

151,525 

133,059 

132,772 

123,204 

122,776 

112,954 

110,498 

99,481 

93,468 

90,410 

87,608 

86,004 

78,367 

76,479 

75,509 

517,941 
246,903 
351,014 



16 per cent. 



STATISTICS. 



235 



VII. Arable land. Of the cultivated land of Eng- 
land and Wales, something over one-fourth 
is held by 874 landowners, while a few 
over 10,000 persons, — who may be liter- 
ally called the "upper ten thousand" — 
hold two-thirds of the whole. 
On the average one person in twenty of the 
population is a land-owner. 

VIII. National debt (at the Revolution in 1688) 

£664,263, or about $3,000,000 

National debt in 1885, £840,850,591, or 

about $4,000,000,000 

Of this enormous sum, it is estimated that about $4.07 
out of every $5.00 was incurred for war. During the 
present century Great Britain's total expenditure for 
war has been about three thousand millions of dollars, 
or somewhat more than the debt incurred by the United 
States during the Civil War. The total National Debt 
of Great Britain is now about double that of this coun- 
try, and does not decrease, while, during the past ten 
years, the National Debt of the U. S. has been reduced 
22 per cent. 

IX. Total revenue of Great Britain is nearly £110,000,000 

Total expenditure on the army about . . £16,000,000 

Total expenditure on the navy . . . £12,000,000 

Interest charge on the National Debt . . £28,000,000 

X. Regular army 201,905 

Regular army reserve 50,760 

Navy (by far the most powerful in the world) 
Ironclads (6 of over 10,000 tons, 22 of over 

6,000 tons) 73 

Steamships 309 

Other vessels 147 



Total 

XI. National Wealth. The total wealth of 
Great Britain is estimated by Mr. Giffen, 
head of the Statistical Department of 



52!) 



236 STATISTICS. 

the Board of Trade, at £8,500,000,000, 1 

or $40,000,000,000 

Total savings bank deposits, about £81,000,- 
000, or $400,000,000 

XII. Education and Illiteracy (Great Britain) : — 
Average attendance at public elementary 

schools (1879) 3,300,000 

Percentage of adults unable to read or write, 17 

Percentage in the United States over ten 

years of age (including negroes) about . 15 

Pauperism and crime in England (1884) : — 
Total number of persons relieved, about . 800,000 

Total number of persons convicted of crime 

(1884) 2 11,500 

About 3 out of every 100 now receive workhouse 
relief. 

Total number of paupers in the United 
States (1880) 88,665 

Or 1 out of every 568. 

Religion (England and Wales) : — 

Church of England (per cent of population), 77 

Dissenters 17 

Roman Catholic 4 

Vital statistics : — 

Average death-rate per 1000 in England and 

Wales (1884) 20 

Average for the United States (1880) 3 . . 18 

Average wages of leading industries in Great 
Britain are about 77 per cent less than in 
the United States. 4 
Average cost of living for same class some- 
thing over 17 per cent less in Great Britain 
than in the United States (of which about 
11.50 per cent is due to cheaper rent). 4 

1 Encyclopedia Britannica, 9th edition. 2 Whitaker. 

3 Scribner's Statistical Atlas, 1880. 

4 Statistics of the Labor Bureau, 1884, Carroll D. Wright. 



STATISTICS. 237 

It follows from the above that the wage-earning class 
are more prosperous in the United States, while the 
class who live on fixed incomes can live better for a 
given sum in Great Britain, the purchasing power of 
money being about 17 per cent greater there than here. 

In production of wealth through commerce, 
manufacture, agriculture, and all other 
branches, Great Britain stood (1880) 1 , £2,024,000,000 
As compared with the United States . £2,004,000,000 
In the department of textiles and hardware, 

Great Britain stood .... £368,000,000 
The United States .... £224,000,000 
Total manufactures, Great Britain stood 

(1880) £758,000,000 

Total of the United States (1880) . £888,000,000 
In carrying power by sea, the United King- 
dom stood (1879) 1 16,630,000 tons. 

The United States stood (1879) . . 2,315,000 tons. 
In agriculture Great Britain is losing ground, 
33 per cent of the meat and 40 per cent 
of the grain consumed by her is imported 
from foreign countries — a large propor- 
tion being from the United States. 

1 Mulhall, Balance Sheet of the World, 1880. 



INDEX. 



Abolition of slavery, 172. 

of compulsory church rates, 
183. 
Act of Uniformity, 100. 

Supremacy, 100. 
Age of stone, 3. 

iron, and of bronze, 3. 
Agincourt, battle of, 71. 
Alabama, steam gunboa*, 183. 

allowed to go to sea, 183. 

her destructive work, 183. 

her depredations paid for, 183. 
Albert, prince consort, 175. 

his interest in art and educa- 
tion, 175. 

his death, 181. 

correct view of Amer. Civil 
War, 182. 
Alfred the Great, 24. 

his victory over the Danes, 20. 

king, lawgiver, educator, 20. 
Alliance with France and Tur- 
key, 180. 
America, colonies taxed, 156. 

revolution began, 159. 

independence acknowledged, 
159. 

naval successes, 165. 

civil Avar, 181. 
Anglo-Saxon Chronicle, 17, 21, 

24. 
Ann of Cleves, 92. 



Anne, Queen, her accession, 144. 

her character, 144. 

her reign corrupt, 144. 
Armada, the Spanish, 8, 108. 

its defeat, 109. 
Arthur, legends of, 21. 
Assize of Arms, 43. 
Augustine, Saint, 22, 23. 

Bacon, Lord Chancellor, 116. 
his downfall and imprison- 
ment, 117. 
Bank of England founded, 144. 
Bannockburn, battle of, 01. 
Barebone's parliament, 120. 
Barons, the, meet at Bury St. 
Edmunds, 53. 
Runnymede, 53. 
Battle Abbey, 31. 
Bayeux tapestry, 32, 61. 
Becket, archbishop of Canter- 
bury, 45. 
resists Henry II., 45. 
murdered, 46. 
Bede, historian, 24, 26. 
Beggars and thieves, increase 

of, 91. 
Bible, King James's edition, 116. 
translation of, distributed, 
93. 
Bill of Bights, 140. 143. 
Black Prince, the, 04, 66. 



240 



INDEX. 



Blenheim, victory of, 147. 
Boadicea, 13". 
Boleyn, Anne, 85, 86, 92. 
Book of Common Prayer com- 
piled, 94. 
Boston, rebellious, 158. 

its tea-party, 158. 

the port closed, 158. 
Bosworth field, battle of, 79. 
Bowlder tombs, 3. 
Boyne, battle of the, 142. 
Bradford, leader of the pilgrims, 

114. 
Bray, vicar of, 101. 
Brewster, ruling elder of pil- 
grims, 114. 
Bright, John, 178. 

friend of America, 182. 
Britain, Roman, 12. 

grain-producing, 14. 

its districts and roads, 15. 
British Museum, referred to, 4. 
Britons, their appeal to Rome, 
19. 

retreat to Wales, 21. 
Bruce, Robert, his bravery and 

victory, 61. 
Bunker-hill, battle of, 159. 
Bunyan, John, imprisoned, 131. 

writes Pilgrim's Progress, 131. 
Buonaparte, Napoleon, his ad- 
vent, 162. 

his hatred of England, 163. 

Cabal, the, 130. 
Cable, ocean telegraph, 181. 
Cade, Jack, his rebellion, 73. 
Csedmon, poet, 24. 
Caesar's invasion, 5, 12, 16. 
Campbell, Sir Colin, 181. 



Canada, w r on, 155. 
Cannon, introduction of, 81. 
Canute, King, 28. 
Carlyle at Stonehenge, 6. 
Catholic emancipation, 169. 
Caxton, William, introduces 

printing, 77. 
Celts, their language, 4. 
Channel, British, its geology and 

depth, 1. 
Charles I., his character, 118. 
quarrels with and dissolves 

parliament, 118. 
summons parliament, 119. 
rejects "petition of right," 

119. 
signs it and violates it, 119. 
rules without parliament, 119. 
"ship-money" exaction, 119. 
quarrels with Scotch church, 

120. 
enters parliament with sol- 
diers, 121. 
leaves London, 121. 
surrendered by the Scotch, 

122. 
tried, condemned, beheaded, 
123. 
Charles II., proclaimed, 124. 
defeated, escapes from Eng- 
land, 125. 
recalled, 129. 
a faithless profligate, 129. 
persecutes non-conformists, 

130. 
signs secret treaty, 132. 
provokes war with Holland, 

133. 
steals bankers' deposits, 133. 
his end, 135. 



INDEX. 



241 



Charter-house, abbot of, 
beheaded, 90. 

Chartists, their demands, 175. 
their threats and their sup- 
pression, 176, 177. 
their just claims allowed, 177. 

Chatham, Lord, friend of Amer- 
ica, 157, 160. 

Children overworked in facto- 
ries, 173. 

Chimneys introduced, 106. 

China, war with, 175. 

Chivalry, ascendant, 63, 64. 

Christ-church school, 95. 

Christianity, brought in by 
Augustine, 22. 

Chronicle, Anglo-Saxon, 17, 21, 
24. 
Froissart's, 61. 

Church, Anglo-Irish, dis-estab- 
lished, 183. 
rates, compulsory, abolished, 
183. 

Clarendon, constitutions of, 44. 

Clive, Lord, 155. 

Cobden, Richard, 178. 

Commerce, English, its rise, 62. 

Commonwealth proclaimed, 124. 

Constantine, his rule, 14. 
crowned at York, 15. 

Constitutional government fully 
established, 174. 

Constitutions of Clarendon, 44. 

Convention parliament, 129. 

Corn-laws repealed, 179. 

Cornwallis, defeat of, 159. 

Corporation and Test acts re- 
pealed, 169. 

Courts, county and baronial, 44. 

Cranmer, Thomas, bishop, 87, 94. 



Creed, revised, 100. 
Crecy, battle of, 64. 
Cromwell, Oliver, Puritan lead- 
er, 123. 
supreme in power, 124. 
expels parliament, 125. 
Lord Protector, 126. 
his death, 127. 
his great services, 128. 
Richard, succeeds his father, 

128. 
his resignation, 128. 
Cromwell, Thomas, vicar gen- 
eral, 88. 
Crusades, the, their effect on 

England, 49. 
Crystal palace in Hyde Park, 
179. 
at Sydenham, 179. 
Culloden, fight at, 154. 

Danegeld, its origin, 28. 
Danes, invasion of, 24. 

at Wedmore, 26. 
Declaration of Rights, 140. 
Divine right of kings, 115. 

of the people, 143. 
Domesday book, 34. 
Drake, Admiral Sir Francis, 108. 
Druid priests, 5. 
Drunkenness prevalent, 153. 
Dudley, Lord, put to death, 96. 
Dunstan, Saint, archbishop of 
Canterbury, 27. 

East India Company, 158, 160. 
Edgehill, battle of, 121. 
Edward the Confessor, 28. 
his tomb in Westminster 
Abbey, 29. 



242 



INDEX. 



Edward I., a wise king, 59, 62. 
promotes unity, 59, 
conciliates Wales, 59. 
subdues Scotland, 60. 
expels the Jews, 60. 
mourns Queen Eleanor, 60. 
Edward II., "no king/' 61, 62. 

deposed, murdered, 61. 
Edward III., " gallant king," 
62. 
invades France, 63. 
victorious at Crecy and Poic- 
tiers, 63, 64. 
Edward IV., House of York, 76, 

77. 
Edward VI., king, 94. 

confiscates Romish church 
property, 95. 
Edward, young Prince, mur- 
dered, 78. 
Eleanor, Queen, 60. 
Electoral reform bill, 183. 
Elizabeth, daughter of Edward 

IV, 80. 
Elizabeth, Queen, 99. 
her ministers, 99, 104. 
her character, 101, 102, 103. 
literature of her reign, 104, 

106. 
her death, 105, 110. 
signs Mary's death warrant, 

107. 
her tomb, 111. 
Emerson at Stonehenge, 6. 

quoted, 82. 
Empson, "the notorious," 82. 
England, its geology and geogra- 
phy, 7. 
its climate, 9. 
its industrial divisions, 9. 



English, the, a colonizing peo- 
ple, 8. 
channel, a safeguard, 8. 

Famine, the Irish, 178. 

Farrar, Archdeacon, his sum- 
mary of duty, 187. 

Fawkes, Guy, his treason and 
execution, 116. 

Feudalism ended, 67, 76, 134. 

Fire, the great, in London, 131. 

Fisher, Bishop, beheaded, 89. 

Flodden Field, battle of, 84. 

Florida ceded to England, 155. 

Free trade extended, 179. 

French revolution, 162. 
of 1848. 176. 

Froissart's Chronicles, 61. 

Fry, Elizabeth, philanthropist, 
162. 

Gaslight introduced, 165. 
George I., his accession, 149. 

his character, 150. 
George II. could speak English, 
152. 
his many wars, 153. 
George III., " born an English- 
man," 155. 
would "be a king," 155. 
loses American colonies, 159. 
his insanity, 168. 
his death, 168. 
George IV., a dissolute spend- 
thrift, 168. 
treatment of Queen Caroline, 

168. 
his death, 170. 
Gibraltar taken, 147. 
Gildas, historian, 24. 



INDEX. 



243 



Gladstone, prime minister, 183. 
Glastonbury, Abbot of, behead- 
ed, 90. 
Glendower, Owen, 70. 
Gordon, Lord George, riots, 160. 
Government of Great Britain, 201. 
Government, constitutional 
history, 207. 

political history, 207. 

statistics, 233. 
Grand Armada, 108, 109. 
Grand jury instituted, 44. 
Great Britain, its geological 
structure, 1. 

its geography, 7. 

its insular form, 7. 

name adopted, 148. 
Grey, Lady Jane, her accession, 
96. 

her death on the scaffold, 96. 
Gunpowder plot, 116. 

Habeas Corpus Act, established, 

134. 
Hadrian's conquest, 14. 
Hampden, John, resists illegal 
exaction, 118. 

imprisoned, 119. 

refuses ship-money, 120. 

again imprisoned, 120. 

tried and acquitted, 120. 
Harold, Saxon king, 29. 

his defeat, 31. 
Hastings, battle of (Pevensey), 

31. 
Hastings, Warren, 160, 180. 

tried and acquitted, 160. 
Havelock, Sir Henry, 181. 
Hawkins, Sir John, slave trader, 

147. 



Henry I., his English birth, 39. 
his good queen, Maude, 40. 
" lion of justice/' 40. 
Henry II., King, 42. 
annexed Ireland, 43. 
scutage and assize of arms, 43. 
complete executive system, 

43. 
does penance at Becket's 

tomb, 46. 
dies, broken-hearted, 47. 
Henry III., a child always, 55. 
Westminster Abbey, his 
work, 56. 
Henry IV., house of Lancaster, 

70. 
Henry V., war with France, 71. 
Henry VI., King, 72. 

needed a guardian, 73. 
Henry VII., King, 80. 

marries Elizabeth, 80. 
Henry VIII., his character, 83. 
Romanist, " defender of the 

faith," 84. 
his six marriages, 92. 
" head of the church," 88, 89. 
excommunicated, 90. 
" bloody act," 93. 
indiscriminate persecutions, 

93. 
his death, 94. 
High-Commission Court, estab- 
lished, 119. 
abolished, 121. 
Hill, Sir Rowland, 175. 
History, constitutional, outline 
of, 207. 
political, outline of, 207. 
House of Commons, its first ses- 
sion, 58. 



244 



INDEX. 



Howard, Catherine, 92. 
Howard, John, philanthropist, 

162. 
Hundred years' war, 62, 64. 

India, French attempts in, 155. 

English empire in, estab- 
lished, 155. 

Sepoy rebellion, 180. 
Insular form of Great Britain, 

its security, 7, 8. 
Ireland annexed, 43. 

submission to England, 110. 

union with Great Britain, 163. 
Irish famine, 178. 

troubles, 183. 

land-bill, 183. 

league, 183. 

Jackson, General Andrew, 165. 
James I., his character, 112. 

persecutes Puritans, 114. 

proclaims divine right of 
kings, 115. 

prints revision of Bible, 116. 

his death, 118. 
James II., would displace parlia- 
ment, 135. 

would restore popery, 135. 

approves Jeffrey's brutality, 
137. 

tries to pervert Magdalen 
College, 138. 

the English Church, 138. 

flees to France, 139. 

lands in Ireland, 142. 

his cowardice, 142. 

his son, " the old pretender," 
150. 



Jeffreys, Judge, " the infamous," 
136. 

his brutality, 137. 
Jews, expelled by Edward I., 

60. 
Joan of Arc, in arms, 72. 

burned at the stake, 72. 
John, " Lackland," king, 50. 

his quarrels, 50, 51. 

excommunicated, 51. 

signs Magna Carta, 53. 

his base character, 55. 

Katharine of Aragon, 84, 86. 
Kaulbach, his " age of the Refor- 
mation," 83. 
Kit's Coty-house, 3. 

La Hogue, victory of, 142. 
Lancaster, house of, 70. 
Laud, Archbishop, 119. 

his High Commission Court, 
119. 

condemned to death, 121. 
Law reform, 185. 
Laws, penal, mitigated, 161. 
Lexington, fight at, 159. 
Liberty of the press established, 

141. 
Liturgy in Scotland, 120. 
Locomotive steam-engine in- 
vented, 169. 
Lollards, persecution of, 71. 
London, its beginning, 13. 

surrenders to William the 
Conqueror, 32. 

its charter from William, 32. 

plague of 1349, 65. 

plague of 1665, 131. 

great fire of 1666, 131. 



INDEX. 



245 



Long parliament, 120. 

Lords, House of, abolished, 123. 

Louis XIV., 142. 

his evil designs, 146. 
Louis XVI., beheaded, 162. 

Magna Carta, signed, 53. 
its stipulations, 54. 
confirmed thirty-seven times, 
54. 
Marie Antoinette beheaded, 162. 
Marlborough, duchess of, 145. 

duke of, 147. 
Marston-moor, battle of, 122. 
Mary, " Bloody," 85. 
queen, 96. 

marries Philip II., 97. 
persecutes Protestants, 97. 
her death, 98, 107. 
her character, 99. 
Mary, Queen of Scots, beheaded, 

107. 
Masham, Mrs., 145. 
Matilda claims the crown, 40. 
Maude, " good queen," 40. 
Methodism, its birth, 153. 
Mill, John Stuart, his correct 
view of American civil 
war, 182. 
Missionaries, earliest Protestant, 

127. 
Monmouth, Duke of, his insur- 
rection, 135. 
defeated at Sedgemoor, 135. 
captured and executed, 136. 
Montrose, the brave, 124. 
More, Thomas, chancellor, be- 
headed, 89. 
Morton, Cardinal, his "fork," 
81. 



Names, Roman, Danish, Nor- 
man, 10. 

Saxon, Celtic, Welsh, 10. 
Xaseby, victory of, 122. 
National debt, its beginning, 143. 
Nelson, his victories and death, 
162. 

his monument in London, 162. 
New Orleans, battle of, 165. 
Newspapers established, 142, 148. 
Nile, battle of, 162. 
No-popery riots, 160. 
Norman invasion, 30. 

conquest, its results, 36. 
Northmen, their incursions, 25, 
28. 

Oates, Titus, his infamous plot, 

1 qq 
loo. 

Opium war, 175. 

Pakenham, Sir Edward, 165. 

Palmerston, Lord, allows the 
Alabama to escape, 183. 

Parr, Catherine, 92. 

Peel. Sir Robert, prime minister, 
177. 
concedes repeal of corn-laws, 
179. 

Peerage, 188. 

Peerages sold, 116. 

Penny postage established, 175. 

People, rise of, 193. 

Percy, Henry, " Hotspur," 71. 

Personal government ended, 174. 

Petition of Right, 119. 

Philip of France harasses Eng- 
lish ships, 63. 
forms alliance with Scotland, 
63. 



246 



INDEX. 



Philip II. of Spain, a selfish fa- 
natic, 97. 
marries Mary, 97. 
his invasion of England, 108. 
grand armada, 108. 
Piers Plowman, 67. 
Pilgrims, the, escape to Holland, 
114. 
to New England, 114. 
Plague in London, 1349, 65. 
1665, 131. 

throughout England, 65. 
Plantagenets, the, 42. 
Plassey, battle of, 155. 
Plymouth, New England, the 

Pilgrims' refuge, 114. 
Poictiers, battle of, 64. 
Poor-law, the earliest, 110. 
Prehistoric man in Britain, 2. 
Press, the, liberty of, 141. 
Preston-pans, fight at, 154. 
Pretender, " the old," James 
Erancis Edward, 150. 
"the young," Charles Ed- 
ward, 151, 154. 
Pride, Colonel, "purges" par- 
liament, 123. 
Prison reform, 162, 185. 
Public (government) schools es- 
tablished, 183. 
Puritans, origin of the name, 113. 
petition, James II., 113. 
settle Boston, etc., 114. 

Quebec taken by Wolfe, 155. 

Railways begun, 169. 
Raleigh, Sir "Walter, his enter- 
prise, 117. 
beheaded, 117. 



Reformation, the, age of, 83. 
Reform bill, the, 170. 
Revolution, the, peaceful and 

complete, 139. 
Richard, " Cceur de Lion," 47. 

joins the crusades, 48. 

prisoner in Austria, 48. 
Richard II., "the Redeless," 66. 

hated by nobles, clergy, peo- 
ple, 69. 

murdered at Pontefract, 69. 
Richard III., murders young 
princes, 78. 

king, his character, 78. 

killed on Bosworth Eield, 79. 
Robsart, Amy, 103. 
Roman Catholic emancipation, 

169. 
Roman invasion, 12. 
Romilly, Sir Samuel, 162. 
Roses, the, wars of, 71, 74. 

union of, 80. 
Rotten boroughs, 170. 
Roundheads, 122. 
Royal Society founded, 134. 
" Rump " parliament, 123. 
Russell, Lord William, unjustly 
condemned, 134. 

his fortitude, 134. 
Russell, Lord John, his misstate- 
ments, 181. 
Russian war with Turkey, 180. 
Ryehouse plot, 134. 
Ryswick, peace of, 142. 

Saint Paul's, built by Wren, 

132. 
first used by William and 

Mary, 143. 
Sanitary reform, 185. 



INDEX. 



217 



Sautry, William, English proto- 

martyr, 71. 
Saxons, their coming, 19, 20. 
Schleswig-Holstein, the cradle 

of the English, 27. 
Schools (government), public, es- 
tablished, 183. 
Scotch church rejects the litur- 
gy, 120. 
Scotland united to England, 

148. 
Scutage, 43. 

Sebastopol captured, 180. 
Sedgemoor, battle of, 135. 
Sepoy rebellion, 180. 
Serfdom doomed, 67. 
Serfs, their condition, 16. 
Seymour, Jane, 92. 
Shakespeare indifferent to popu- 
lar liberty, 74. 
Sherifmuir, battle of, 151. 
Shrewsbury, battle of, 71. 
Simon de Montf ort bridles Henry 
III., 57. 

calls first parliament, 57. 

his character, 58. 

has no monument, 58. 

his work progressing, 59. 
Slavery, negro, abolished, 172. 

white, mitigated, 173. 
South-Sea Company, 151. 
Spectator, the, by Addison, 148. 
Speculation rampant, 151. 
Stamp act passed, 156. 

repealed, 157. 
Star Chamber established, 119. 

abolished, 121. 
Statistics, 233. 
Steam engine, Watt's, 163. 

great effects of, 164. 



Steam ocean navigation begun, 

167. 
Stephen, King, 40. 

his feeble reign, 41. 
Stephenson, George, his experi- 
ments, 169. 
invents locomotive engine, 
169. 
Stonehenge, 6. 

Strafford, tool of Charles I., 119. 
impeached, 120. 
beheaded, 121. 
Supremacy, act of, 100. 
Sweyn of Denmark, king of 

England, 28. 
Sydney, Algernon, beheaded, 
134. 
his fortitude, 134. 
Symnel, Lambert, pretender, 82. 

Tacitus, his remark on Caesar, 13. 
Thirty-nine articles, 100. 
Toleration Act, 141. 
Trafalgar, victory of, 162. 
Tudor, Henry, earl of Richmond 
79. 

he invades England, 79. 

house of, 80. 
Turkey, war with Russia, 180. 
Tyler, Wat, his rebellion, GQ. 

Uniformity, act of, 100. 

United States, independent, 159. 

second war with, 165. 
Utrecht, Treaty of, 147. 

Vane, Sir Harry, 125. 

resists military dictation, 125. 

expelled by Cromwell, 125. 
Vicar of Bray, 101. 



248 



INDEX. 



Victoria, her accession, 173. 

her lineage, 178. 

empress of India, 181. 
Villanage, abolished, 67. 

Wakefield, battle of, 76. 
Wallace, William, patriot, 59. 

captured and executed, 60. 
Walpole, Sir Robert, 150. 

the real ruler, 150. 

his briberies, 152. 

a fox, not a lion, 152. 
Warbeck, pretender, executed, 

82. 
Wars of the Roses, 71, 74. 
Warwick, Earl of, " king-maker," 
76. 

slain, 77. 
Washington, commander-in- 
chief, 159. 
Washington City, 165. 
Waterloo, battle of, 166. 
Watt, James, his invention, 163. 

" power for sale," 163. 
Wedmore, treaty of, 26. 
Welsh, the, their descendants, 22. 
Wesley, John, his labors, 153. 

his great success, 154. 
Whigs and Tories, 145. 
White horse, the Saxon stan- 
dard, 25. 
Wilkes, Capt. Charles, U.S.N., 

182. 
William the Conqueror, his in- 
vasion, 30, 31. 

gives charter to London, 32. 



William the Conqueror builds 
the Tower, 33. 

his character, just, 34. 

on Salisbury plain receives 
oath of allegiance, 35. 

his death, 36. 

his bequests, 37. 
William IV., accession of, 170. 

his character, 170. 
William, prince of Orange, 140. 

summoned to England, 140. 

and Mary proclaimed sover- 
eigns, 140. 

wins battle of the Boyne, 142. 

returns thanks in St. Paul's, 
142. 

his death, 144. 
William Ruf us, his character, 38. 

his death, 39. 
William the Silent, 107. 
Window tax repealed, 179. 
Winthrop arrives at Boston, 114. 
Wolfe's victory at Quebec, 155. 
Wolsey, Cardinal, 85. 

his death, 87. 
Women worked in mines, 173. 
Wool-growing, increase of, 62, 91. 
World's fair, 179. 
Wren, Sir Christopher, 132. 

rebuilds London, 132. 

buried in St. Paul's, 132. 
Wycliffe, John, 68. 

York, Constantine's capital, 15. 

Roman ruins in, 18. 
Yorktown, battle of, 159. 



INDEX 



ACTS OF PARLIAMENT, ETC., IN SECTION XII 

•Ot 

No. 

Act of Settlement 70 

Act of Supremacy 21 

Alfred's Code , 2 

America, Independence of U. S. of 81 

Articles, the Six, of Religion • 23 

Articles, the Thirty-Nine 29 

Bill of Rights 64 

Capital Punishment 95 

Charter of Henry I ' 

Charter of Stephen 8 

Charter, the Great 12 

Charter, William I., to London ■ 

Church of England established 21 

Church Rates abolished 104 

Church Tithes commuted 94 

Commons, House of, founded 14 

Commonwealth, England declared a 43 

Confirmatio Cartarum of Edward I 

Conformity, Occasional 72 

Constitutions of Clarendon 

Conventicle Act 

Corn Laws repealed 

i * 48 

Corporation Act 

Corrupt Practices Act 

~ . A . 112 

Crimes Act 

Criminal Law Reform 9o 



250 INDEX. 

No. 

Debtors, imprisonment of common, abolished 102 

Declaration of Indulgence (first) 54 

Declaration of Indulgence (second) . 58 

Declaration of Rights 60 

Declaration of William of Orange 59 

De Donis (Entail) 15 

Disestablishment of the Irish Church , 105 

Dissenters, relief of (first) 79 

Dissenters, relief of (second) . 87 

Domesday Book compiled 5 

Education Grant 97 

Education (see Schools) 106 

Education (see Universities) 108 

Edward the Confessor, laws of . . '. 3 

Elections, bribery at 113 

England and Scotland united 71 

England, Church of, established 21 

England, Scotland, and Ireland united 83 

Entail, Statute of 15 

Extension of Franchise, 1867 103 

Extension of Franchise, 1884 114 

Feudal laws repealed 47 

Five-Mile Act 53 

Franchise, Bill of, 1867. 103 

Franchise, Bill of, 1884 114 

Franchise in Ireland 90 

Freedom of the press 67 

Geneva Tribunal 109 

Great Britain and Ireland 83 

Great Britain, origin of 71 

Habeas Corpus Act 57 

Henry I., charter of 7 

Heretics, first Act against 19 

Heretics, Mary revives Acts against 26 

High Commission Court 30 

House of Commons, origin of 14 



INDEX. 251 

No. 

House of Commons sentences Charles I 40 

House of Lords abolished 41 

Humble Petition and Advice 46 

Independence of the United States 81 

India, government of 82 

Instrument of Government 45 

Interregnum 60 

Ireland (Crimes Act) 112 

Ireland, property qualification in 90 

Ireland, trade with , 80 

Ireland, union of, with Great Britain 83 

Irish Church disestablished 105 

Irish Land Act (first) 107 

Irish Land Act (second) 110 

Irish Land League 112 

Jews admitted to Parliament 101 

John grants Magna Carta 12 

Kingdom, the United 83 

King, government by a, abolished 42 

King, title of, offered to Cromwell 46 

Laborers, Statute of 16 

Land Act, Irish (first) 107 

Land Act, Irish (second) 110 

Land, free trade in , . . Ill 

Landholders, meeting of 6 

Land League (see Crimes Act) 112 

Laws of Edward the Confessor 3 

Licensing Act 49 

Lollardism punished 19 

London, Charter of 4 

London, recognition of the Corporation of 10 

Lords, House of, abolished 41 

Magna Carta 12 

Marriage Act, Eoyal 77 

Meeting, great, of landholders 6 



252 INDEX. 

No. 

Monasteries, suppression of 22 

Mortmain, Statute of 15 

Mutiny Bill 62 

Navigation Act 44 

Newspaper tax repealed 99 

New Style 75 

Oath of Allegiance and Supremacy 01 

Orders in Council 84 

Oxford, Provisions of 13 

Papists, Act against 56 

Parliament attempts negotiations with Charles 1 35 

Parliament, second attempt at negotiation 37 

Parliament signs Solemn League and Covenant 36 

Parliament, the first complete 15 

Petition of Right 32 

Pillory abolished 95 

Poor Law, the first 31 

Poor Law, the second 93 

Pope, authority of, abolished ... 20 

Pope, decline and destruction of power of 21 

Pope, power of, re-established by Mary 25 

Postage, Penny 96 

Praemunire, Statute of 18 

Prayer Book, issue of the first 24 

Press, freedom of the 07 

Pride's Purge of Parliament 38 

Printing (see Licensing Act) 49 

Printing made free 07 

Property qualification abolished 100 

Property qualification in Ireland 90 

Protestantism established 24 

Provisions of Oxford 13 

Pro visors, Statute of 17 

Punishment, capital 95 

Punishment of heresy, first 19 

Punishment of heresy, revival of 26 



INDEX. 253 

No. 

Quia Emptores, Statute of 15 

Reform Bill of 1832 91 

Reform Bill of 1867 103 

Reform Bill of 1884 114 

Regency Bill 86 

Religion, Protestant, established 24 

Religion, Roman Catholic, restored 25 

Religion, Six Articles of 23 

Religious tests at the Universities abolished 108 

Religion, Thirty-Nine Articles of 29 

Religious Toleration (see Toleration) 03 

Remonstrance, the Grand 34 

Roman Catholics, Act against 69 

Roman Catholic Relief Bill (first) 78 

Roman Catholic Relief Bill (second) 89 

Rome, abolition of the power of the Pope of 20 

Rome, decline and destruction of its power 21 

Saint Albans, assembly at 11 

Salisbury, meeting of Landholders at 6 

Schools, " Board," established 106 

Scotland, union of, with England 71 

Septennial Act . . . 73 

Settlement, Act of 70 

Six Acts, the 88 

Six Articles of Religion, the 23 

Slave trade abolished 85 

Slaves, emancipation of 92 

South Sea Company 74 

Stamp Act passed 76 

Statute against Heretics, first ... 19 

Statute of Entail 15 

Statute of Laborers 16 

Statute of Mortmain 15 

Statute of Praemunire 18 

Statute of Provisors 17 

Statute of Quia Emptores 15 

Stephen's Charter 8 

Style, New, established 75 



254 IKDEX. 

Supremacy, Act of 21 " 

Supremacy, Act of, re-enacted 27 

Test Act 

Thirty-Nine Articles 2 o 

Tithes, Church, commuted C) , 

Toleration Act „ 

Trade, free, in land , -. , 

Trade, free, with Ireland g0 

Treaty of Wedmore , 

Trial of Charles I oq 

Trials for treason ™ 

Triennial Act 00 

Triennial Act repealed 51 

Triennial Act restored 6fi 

Uniformity Act (Edward VI.) 24 

Uniformity Act re-enacted 28 

Uniformity Act, second re-enactment of 50 

Union of England and Scotland 71 

Union of Great Britain and Ireland 33 

United States, Independence of, recognized 81 

Universities, religious tests at, abolished 108 

Voters, number of, admitted in 1885 115 

Wedmore, treaty of I 

William I. calls meeting of Landholders q 

William I. compiles Domesday Book 5 

William I. gives a charter to London 4 



PRE6SWORK BY BERWICK & SMITH, BOSTON. 

LEJe 10 






LIBRARY OF CONGRESS 



02 



933 849 1 



